Harry Potter and the Brothers on the Wall
by kylebachan
Summary: Barry Little has always dreamed of becoming a wizard. But he lives in a rundown suburb in the middle of America. With a little creativity and a lot of help from his friends, the group manages to complete the journey from hood to Hogwarts—where the Triwizard tournament has just wrapped up and students and professors alike are still reeling from the death of Cedric Diggory...
1. Chapter 1

**A Dream in Black and White**

Barry couldn't believe his eyes. Not only was he standing in front of the entrance to the legendary train platform, Nine and Three-Quarters, but the boy who lived, Harry Potter himself, had just rammed through the brick wall with his trolley full of luggage and snowy white owl.

Six months ago, Barry didn't have a clue any of this existed. Most young boys who received their congratulatory letter to Hogwarts, School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, were generally delighted to learn that they had magical abilities. With the American public school system failing, the opportunity to temporarily escape reality was somewhat of a Godsend (especially for those students who weren't set up to follow a _Hoop Dreams_ like scenario). But Barry never received a letter. He had never been told he was a wizard. In fact, he was almost certain that he wasn't supposed to be here and had somehow cheated the system.

Six months ago, Barry was playing around with his bedroom's TV antenna. His mother was behind on the Internet bill again, so he had been trying to intercept his neighbour's signals—he was meant to be writing a report on a world event. All of a sudden, the squiggly lines of static made way for an English sounding announcer:

"... he who shall not be named has returned… son of Amos Diggory murdered… Harry Potter gives no comment on situation…"

To Barry, this didn't make a lot of sense. At least, not at first. It soon became apparent that there was another community out there who was grieving the loss of one of their own. He thought this might make a solid report topic because he had once lost someone close to him too, but he had never had anyone to talk about it with. He sat in front of the television set for hours; after the news bulletins wrapped up, he watched a documentary called _Hogwarts: A History_ which completely changed his life. Could there really be people out there who solved their problems just by waving a stick? He thought about his brother and wondered if things could have been different if he had grown up in England. Did Hogwarts send acceptance letters to his side of the world? Oh, what it would mean to be chosen!

At school the next day, he shared his findings with his peers: "England is home to a secret group of magical people called wizards."

That was enough for the class to erupt into laughter. His English teacher, Mr. Samuel L. Jackson, waved his arms to simmer the students down. "Class enough. Barry, if you aren't going to take your assignments seriously, then we're gonna have to be having a separate conversation."

Barry didn't understand. He copied his notes from the TV report verbatim (though he admitted that the signal wasn't so great and there were probably discrepancies). He continued anyways, "At the age of eleven, each child with magical abilities is invited to come study at a wizarding University called Hogwarts…" One of his classmates, Ice Cube, interrupted the presentation.

"What kind of name is Hogwarts anyways? I'm guessing they don't take in vegetarians." Cube smirked at his own joke but the class mostly didn't take notice.

Barry continued. "It's a school that allows you to reach your full potential. It doesn't matter who your family is or what your grades were, they'll take anyone who wants to succeed. And it's a safe place, they don't allow any weapons on the school grounds, all the teachers seem really friendly and best of all, they give all the students these really big meals, as much as you can eat, and for free—it's like you're living in a castle."

The class leaned forward. Ice Cube, who had previously been chewing a pencil, spit out the eraser end and relaxed his hands. "Damn, that actually sounds pretty good." The class nodded their heads in agreement. At the back of the class, a girl with bookworm glasses and a wool sweater wrapped over her shoulders timidly raised her hand. Barry, who for once in his life finally had the attention of his peers, excitedly pointed to her. "Yes Rosa?"

Rosa blushed as the entire class turned in their seats to face her. "How does one get an acceptance letter exactly?"

"Yeah Barry, how does _one_ get a letter _exactly_?" Buggin' Out was one of Barry's best friends. With his bright yellow shirt and perpetually jammin' hairdo, he had no doubt that he would be in his bedroom after school, wanting to see the wizard channel for himself.

Mr. Jackson decided that enough was enough. "Look Barry, this was a pretty good story and all but if you want to go to a real college, you're going to need to write me a real report. And furthermore..." His attention had turned to the cloud of smoke that was slowly forming in the corner of the room. "Jesus Christ. Snoop, what the fuck did I say about lighting up in class?"

"Sorry, nephew."

"I'm not your goddamn nephew!"

Back at home, Barry was once again trying to adjust his television's signal to the wizard network. Only this time, he had an audience. Buggin' Out was occupying himself with Barry's old Game Boy while his mother, Miss Charlene Little poured out glasses of grape drink for the two boys. Though she didn't have much else other than her son and her one floor house, and sometimes regretted not being able to offer Barry a wealthier upbringing, she was glad that her son was at least spending his time where she could keep an eye on him.

"Barry, I don't want you messing with that antenna anymore." Miss Little knew what her son was up to, " I told you we're getting Internet back by the end of this week."

Barry groaned, "You said that last week."

Buggin' Out chimed in, "And the week before that one too."

Miss Little handed him a glass, "Buggin' Out, you better watch yourself if you want to keep coming over here."

Suddenly, the static on the TV set turned to sound and a British sporting announcer broke through. Buggin' Out jumped out of his chair and landed on his knees in front of the screen, "Oh shit! Here we go!"

"Language, Buggin' Out!" Miss Little couldn't help but watch the screen as it filled up with hoops and wizards on broomsticks. She had received a call from Mr. Jackson earlier letting her know about Barry's presentation. She had never known her son to lie to get out of doing work, so she figured there must have been some sort of misinterpretation. It only took three hours of being glued to the screen before she was a believer.

"Grab the snitch, bitch!"

Buggin' Out had called up virtually everyone he knew and by 9pm, over half of the neighbourhood had gathered into Barry Little's living room. Mr. Jackson, normally known for being much more reserved in such social situations, was laughing excitedly at the screen and shouting at Quidditch players as if he had supported them his entire life. Martin, another one of Barry's classmates was already writing his Hogwarts entrance essay. Ice Cube was flicking a stick he had picked up off the front lawn outside, shouting words that sounded both Latin and proper. Snoop Dogg was completely entranced by what he saw on screen: the broomsticks, the spells, the dwarfs—watching the Quidditch match alone was the best trip he had been on in a long time.

Though it was exciting for his family to be the centre of attention for once, something about all this was upsetting Barry. "Hey guys," he started. "Wouldn't it be great to go to Hogwarts?"

"Hell yeah!" the group agreed in unison.

"No, I mean..." Barry watched the tail end of a broom as it soared through the tallest hoop at the end of the arena. The stadium's audience erupted into cheers as smoke from the tip of the broom spelled out the words, _SPONSORED BY QUALITY QUIDDITCH SUPPLIES_. "Wouldn't it be great if we could actually go to Hogwarts. I mean for real."

Mr. Jackson, who had previously lit up a pipe without anyone noticing, exhaled and said, "Listen Barry, even if this was all true and not some elaborate prank, I don't want you to get your hopes up. The odds of a school like Hogwarts reaching out to kids on the other side of the world is one in a—"

Buggin' Out held up his hand to silence the room and shift attention to himself. "I have an idea."

Mr. Jackson sighed, "Buggin' Out, I don't think anything good has ever followed one of your ideas."

Buggin' Out ignored him, "Listen up. I'm watching all these wizards on the TV and one thing is clear."

Miss Little had already started to clean up the dishes from around the room (she had an early start the next morning), "And what's that?"

"There ain't any brothas. Not on the wizard news, not on the Quidditch pitch, not in the commercials. It's like an episode of _Full House_ over there."

Cube squinted at the TV. "Hey man, I'm sure I saw at least one negro with a broomstick."

Buggin' Out snorted, "Fine, it's like U.S. Congress then. My point is—that nobody is scooping up any of those sweet, sweet and beautiful minority scholarships."

"What makes you think they even have any minority scholarships in the magical world?"

"Even better. If they don't have any, we could probably guilt them into starting some."

"Buggin' Out, that's the stupidest idea I've ever heard—"

Six months later, Barry stood in front of a brick wall with his friends. Without hesitating, he stepped through the gateway; the edges of his old world began to blur as the excited chatter of children and parents warmed his ears. As the new world came into focus, a cloud of steam puffed out of a smokestack as the Hogwarts Express pulled into the platform. Barry's story was about to begin.


	2. Chapter 2

**Ron Weasley's a Racist**

Everyone was staring at him. Though the doors of the Hogwarts Express hadn't yet opened for boarding, its future passengers were now temporarily distracted by the sudden appearance of Barry. Nobody spoke to him directly but he could make out some of the whispers:

"... never seen him before…"

"... who's he with?..."

"... is that a muggle?"

Barry barely had time to decide what to do next because he was quickly shoved from behind as the rest of his friends piled in behind him.

Ice Cube adjusted his new sunglasses. "Yo, this is dope. I can't wait to get onboard this thing." He ran right up to the train to admire its engineering. He called back, "This right here is some steampunk shit! And would you take a look at that finish!" He burst into a sprint towards the nearest carriage door. A young girl with frizzy brunette hair, who had been watching Cube since his emergence through the gateway, jumped back startled when it looked as if he might run right into her.

Cube screeched to a halt. "Oh sorry about that ma'am. I just got excited about the train is all. I used to have a model set that reminded me of this one." He winked at her before turning around to rejoin his friends. "Save me a seat when you get inside?"

Hermione blushed as Ron grabbed her arm and ushered her into the tram. Cube locked eyes with the scrawny ginger who immediately averted his gaze and boarded the train.

"Yeah, that's what I thought… red-headed fuck," Cube muttered to himself.

Mr. Jackson jogged over and slapped Cube on the shoulder. "Hey Cube, you can't be chatting up any underage sweet things over here. From what I've heard you don't want to end up in wizarding jail. Sounds worse than Guantanamo. Wizards ain't got no rights in wizarding jail."

Cube was taken aback. "Shit, underage? Man, she looked at least twenty-five."

"Twenty-five? I'm almost positive she's fifteen. Plus, you're a grown ass man, you're better off trying to do the dirty with the professors instead of the students."

"Nigga, you better watch what you say. My aging feelings are delicate."

"You grandma chasing mother fucker."

Something that should be said is that the ages of Mr. Jackson's students varied wildly. At eleven years old, Barry was by far the youngest, while the others occupied their twenties and thirties and even forties. It wasn't the most traditional elementary school class, but that's another story.

Elsewhere, aboard the train, a much more serious conversation was taking place. As part of their own tradition, Harry, Ron, and Hermione had occupied a compartment by themselves where they could discuss the events of the previous year, and what might possibly come next. As usual, Harry had bought out the entire Honeydukes Express trolley.

"The thing is…" Harry began. "If Voldemort has really returned for good—"

Both Ron and Hermione gasped. "Harry, don't say the name!"

"If _Voldemort_ has returned for good," Harry repeated, "It means that Hogwarts is in danger and I have to convince Professor Dumbledore to shut down the school. Make sure all the students are out of danger since it's me he really wants."

Ron looked crushed. "Don't you think we should just wait a few years and see what happens first? You know… play it by ear?"

Hermione elbowed her boyfriend and put his hand in her lap. "No, Harry's right. We don't have time to wait." Over the summer, Hermione decided to follow her own words. After the tragic death of Cedric Diggory and seeing the state of grief it had left Cho Chang in, she decided to bite the bullet and make her relationship with Ron a reality. Though it was initially exciting to find out that they had both had a crush on each other, it was starting to seem a little… forced. She had never dated anyone before and had always thought that the man she ended up with would break down the wall he had been hiding himself behind and become someone brand new. As it happened, behind Ron Weasley's wall was simply... Ron Weasley.

Ron reached into the trolley to grab a chocolate frog. He didn't return his hand to Hermione's lap after finishing—a motion that Harry picked up on.

"So," Ron started through a mouthful of chewy goodness. "Where do things stand with you and Cho?"

"RON!" Hermione shot him a death stare.

He shrugged. "What? She's back on the market now. I say that Harry should make his move. Look at the state she was in. You'd be able to skip the first few letters of the _D.E.N.N.I.S._ system."

"After all Harry's been through, Ron? You think that Harry would really be thinking of girls at a time like this?"

Harry snapped out of a momentary fantasy. He chimed in, "No… no, of course I wouldn't. I just watched Cedric die in front of me. To make a move on Cho would be terrible… just terrible..."

Hermione leaned forwards, encouraging the two boys to huddle up. She lowered her voice to a whisper: "I heard that they're going to be using dementors as hall monitors this year. To discourage anyone from trying any funny business at Hogwarts."

Ron looked shocked. "Dementors? Can they even control those things?"

Suddenly, the compartment door slid open and Buggin' Out leapt onto the seat beside Harry. "Dementors!" he exclaimed. "I heard them niggas suck the soul right out of your dick if you look at them too long." He started helping himself to one of the cart's cauldron cakes.

Annoyed that someone had barged in without knocking, Harry attempted to maintain his composure. "Excuse me, this is a private compartment."

But Buggin' Out had already removed his shoes. "I heard they send Dementors to prisons to reward bad wizards before they die. Instead of getting a final meal before getting executed, they get their dick sucked."

Hermione couldn't take this anymore. "I'm sorry, but that's completely wrong. It's a well known fact that the dementor kiss—"

"I heard they only suck white dick because they hate chocolate."

The centre vein in Hermione's forehead was ready to pop. " _Where_ are you getting your facts from?"

Suddenly, Ice Cube appeared in the opened doorway. "Can you believe this bullshit?" he glanced at Hermione briefly but looked straight at Buggin' Out instead. "I haven't eaten since breakfast and I just found out that some greedy fuck bought the entire Honeydukes Express cart for himself." His eyes panned down, finally noticing the half eaten cart between the students. "Oh, I see how it is." He quickly swiped several cauldron cakes from the second shelf, maintaining eye contact with Ron until he could cradle no more in his arms.

"A change of company, Potter?" The unmistakable slime of a voice crept up behind Cube, itching for attention, greased up with condescension, until it could be no more clear that the annoyance known as Draco Malfoy was standing behind them. "You've always been a shining example of pure class."

With a mouthful of cake, Ice Cube spun around. "You lost, boy?"

Draco nervously took a step back, "I was just leaving… but before I do…" He began to reach into his garments to unholster the wand that was tucked between his belt strap. With lightning fast reflexes, Cube whipped out his own piece, and aimed it square between Draco's eyes. Hermione screamed while both Harry and Ron ducked for cover.

Still finishing his cake, Cube declared, "Please Lord, let this fool even start to say some magical latin bullshit so I can bust his ass. You want to light up the room? Say _lumos_ , bitch. You know you want all of the lights. Fast cars? Shooting stars?"

"What the hell are you doing?" Mr. Jackson appeared behind Cube, forcing his trigger arm down and taking the gun. "You know they don't allow weapons at Hogwarts."

"Relax teacher, it's just a BB gun. He learned his lesson." He looked down at Draco who was creating a puddle of urine on the floor. "I hope there's a spell for that."

He looked into the compartment where Buggin' Out was busy with his Gameboy. Hermione was still breathing heavily while Ron, who had curled up into the corner, now appeared to be incredibly relieved. Cube directed his attention towards him. "And you're a racist for thinking my gun was real."

Harry piped up. "I didn't think it was real."

"I didn't ask you, you forehead-cutting emo bitch."

Harry traced the outline of the lightning bolt scar with the tip of his fingers.

Mr. Jackson puts his hand on Cube's shoulder and began to usher him back down the tram. "You can't be pulled those kinds of pranks here. Brothas go to jail back home for much less, imagine what wizard brothas probably go to jail for. You don't want to end up in a room with a bunch of dementors."

Cube sighed. "No joke, I heard dementors suck the soul right out of your dick."

Meanwhile, at the front of the train, Barry and his friends were having trouble boarding. When Barry had been given his acceptance letter, it also came with a round trip ticket, to and from Hogwarts—but it wasn't assigned seating, which had now become an issue. According to the conductor, a three foot goblin who appeared to be an ex-teller at Gringotts, there weren't any more available seats.

Barry was crushed. What would his mother say if he went home now? That she was right. That the school didn't really chose me to be one of its students and that I wouldn't belong. But he had come too far to turn around, and he had waited too long for this change.

"Couldn't we stand in the hallway?" Barry asked hopefully.

Without looking at Barry, the conductor replied, "It's a safety hazard. It simply cannot happen."

Mr. Jackson and Cube strolled up the hallway and noticed Barry standing outside the front door. "Hey, what's the holdup here. Is there a problem officer?"

The conductor adjusted the oval glasses that were sliding down the end of his pointed nose. "I am not a cop. I'm a conductor."

"Then back the fuck off and let my friend on the train!" Mr. Jackson slid open the compartment to his left which only hosted one occupant, Neville Longbottom. "There are plenty of seats all over this goddamn train!" Neville quickly threw his luggage over the seat opposite him and laid back, stretching out his arms and legs so he was spread himself all over his own seat.

"Sorry, sir," Neville interrupted, "There doesn't appear to be any room here."

"Boy, don't play this bullshit with me. There are three unoccupied seats in there and I just saw you cover them up—"

Without warning, the goblin flicked his wrist and allowed a thin wand to fall out of his sleeve. Holding the tip of his wand up to his throat, he made a humming sound (which in turn caused the wand to start whistling).

 _SNAP_.

"Excuse me." A large shaggy man, with tattered clothing and a beard that appeared to have wood chips stuck in it, suddenly materialized behind Mr. Jackson. "I just received word that I'll be escorting your group to Hogwarts… on account of there not being any more room on the train."

Mr. Jackson spun around, flabbergasted. "Goddamn. Who the hell are you?"

Hagrid bowed. "I'm the gamekeeper and keeper of keys. And I've just been informed by our goblin friend here that ya'll are in need of some transportation assistance."

Still in awe from Hagrid's theatrical entrance, Mr. Jackson nearly stumbled as he took a step back.

Barry too was impressed by the sudden sight of Hagrid. He pulled at the larger man's sleeve. "Are we going to teleport with you, mister?" he asked.

Hagrid crouched down on his knees to lower himself to Barry's level (though it didn't make much of a height difference). "Not exactly, young one."

Mr. Jackson looked out at the empty platform. Forty five minutes ago, he never would have guessed that it was filled with the sound of luggage carts squealing, first years sobbing to return home, or carrier owls hooting as their cages rattled against the compartment doors. The parents had long said their goodbyes and the only ones who had yet to find their place appeared to be his students. Along the pillars that ran from one end of the platform to the other, were a series of moving posters carrying messages like—"See you there", "Don't get left behind", and "Your Future Awaits".

Mr. Jackson began rubbing the lenses of his glasses clean as he turned back to Hagrid. "So... how the hell are we supposed to get to Hogwarts?"


	3. Chapter 3

**The Underground Railroad**

Leading the way through the darkened underground, while swinging a massive lantern that on multiple occasions nearly struck Barry out cold, Hagrid was at a loss for words for how he should entertain his new party.

Buggin' Out was still preoccupied with his video games but the others seemed much more solemn. Ice Cube hadn't spoken a word since they had made the descent (and made a point of walking with his arms crossed) while Mr. Jackson seemed more concerned that the tunnel they were in could collapse at any moment.

"So…" Hagrid began, "Does anyone want to sing any songs? Wade in the Water has always been one of my personal favourites."

Ice Cube's eyes widened as he turned to Mr. Jackson. "Can I have my piece back now?"

Elsewhere, in a land far from Hogwarts, and England itself, near the most Northern tip of Sweden, a grand fire was being lit. As the flames began to dance out in the cold, whipping wind of the winter's night, the sudden sounds of popping began to circle about, as wizards and criminals began to apparate into view.

To avoid detection, the Death Eater's circle had chosen their new meeting spot in a much more remote spot than where they had hosted the ceremony in which the Dark Lord was resuscitated. As such, many of them were nowhere near as adapted to the cold weather as the werewolf who had suggested the locale—Fenrir Greyback breathed in the cool air; clearly, he was in his element. The others instantly began to craft fire spells around their bodies, which created a warm glow that could be seen many miles down the mountain.

"Fools!" Voldemort cried out as Bellatrix Lestrange wrapped him in a warm blanket. "The Ministry of Magic has been on high alert since Potter spoiled the surprise of my return. Everyone within a hundred miles of here can see the fire light you imbeciles are creating!"

The wizards mumbled several words to themselves and the fire spell began to fade away. They hugged their shoulders as they shivered together.

"Now then," Voldemort began. "To the first order of business." He removed a rolled up piece of parchment from his robes and paused. He glanced around the circle and cleared his throat. The other wizards all turned their heads to look at Lucius Malfoy.

Malfoy's eyes widened. "But sire? You said I wouldn't have to do this anymore if I helped lead the Potter boy to you!"

Voldemort was losing his patience. "Oh, I'm sorry I forgot that _you_ make the rules around here. Did everybody else get that memo except for me?"

The other Death Eaters shook their heads enthusiastically.

"Do not make me clear my throat again, Lucious."

Malfoy rushed over to Voldemort until he was standing before him. He spun around, embracing the humiliation as Voldemort opened up the parchment and rolled it across Lucious' back.

"The first order of business," he continued. "Is in fact, the only order of business. It has come to my attention that the socially challenged Headmaster of Hogwarts will not be shutting down the school as we had initially suspected he might. This has presented us with a valuable opportunity. Something that we should—" He suddenly became aware of the new outfit that the mole-like wizard known as Peter Pettigrew had decided to wear to the meeting.

"Ummm, Peter… would you care to explain why you're dressed like that?"

Though Pettigrew was wearing the traditional long dark robes that signalled a membership in the Death Eater society, he was also wearing a tall pointed hood, one that completely masked his face and seemed to blow from side to side as the wind passed over the group.

"I f-f-found it in a Muggle h-history book," he stammered. "It was a very effective element of f-f-fear when they were chasing down black Muggles. And we've all the heard the rumours of Hogwarts accepting more b-b-black—"

"Whoa whoa whoa," Voldemort held up his hand. "I really hope you are not implying what I _think_ you are implying."

"I just t-t-thought," Pettigrew continued, "That in your quest to enslave the wizarding world, it would be easier to first enslave—"

"WHOA!" Voldemort waved his arm to cut Pettigrew off. "Ok, that's going a bit too far. Death Eaters kill, but we do NOT discriminate. I want you all to repeat that."

The circle murmured the phrase in unison.

Voldemort breathed a sigh of relief. "I just don't want anyone to get the wrong idea and think that I'm a… well, you know…" Voldemort squinted out just behind the circle of Death Eaters. His eyes widened as he noticed the castle in the distance.

"Hold on a second," he exclaimed frantically. "Is that the Durmstrang Institute?!" He turned to face Greyback. "You told me this was remote!"

Greyback growled. "It is remote. Relatively speaking."

"Relatively speaking? What part of 'I DON'T WANT ANYONE TO KNOW WE'RE HERE DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND?'"

"It is OK," Greyback replied. "Even if anyone could see anything, the students here are more conservative than the ones at Hogwarts. I feel like they would be much more sympathetic to the Death Eater cause."

"THAT'S THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE OF WHAT I WANT!" Voldemort screamed. "DO YOU THINK IT MATTERS WHETHER THE STUDENTS ARE SYMPATHETIC TO OUR CAUSE IF THEY TELL THE AUTHORITIES WHERE WE ARE?"

Greyback lowered his head in shame. "I guess I didn't think of that, M'Lord."

"You have my permission to think next time," Voldemort began to regain his calm. "Now we'd better wrap this up before someone… Jesus, Peter! What are you doing?"

Pettigrew was teaching the Death Eater to his side, Bartemius Crouch Jr., how to properly tie a noose. "Oh, I was just showing Barty here how to—"

"And why do you even have that rope? Actually, I don't want to know. That's it! We're done here. I don't care!" And with a swift _pop_ , Voldemort apparated away in a flash, leaving the Death Eaters staring at each other blankly, unsure of what they should do in his absence.

Finally, Lucius Malfoy straightened out, allowing the parchment he was holding up to fall to the ground. "My back's killing me," he groaned.


	4. Chapter 4

**The Fifth House**

"I'm sorry to announce that Defense Against the Dark Arts has been cancelled, henceforth!" Dumbledore explained, triggering a much expected roar of boos and hisses from his audience. "It simply doesn't make financial sense to continue a program in which we have to replace its professor every year."

"But Professor!" cried Percy Weasley. "That was the one credit I was missing to graduate!" Percy Weasley's final year at Hogwarts was meant to be last year but after failing Defense Against the Dark Arts (the professor of which, went MIA late semester), he was forced to return for a victory lap.

Dumbledore waved his hand. "Nevermind, Percy. In its place, I am pleased to announce the introduction of Dimensional Theory which will be taught by my old friend, Professor Koreander. A balding man in a green blazer sat next to Dumbledore. At the mention of his name, he simply nodded and inhaled into his smoke pipe.

"But more on that later. Second on the agenda… ah, yes... our very own Professor McGonagall has taken the initiative to make Hogwarts a much more _green_ experience. That means recyclable everything. Cups, utensils, toilet paper—"

"Not the toilet paper!" the Weasley twins cried together.

"... to name a few. But I'm sure you'll hear plenty more about it from her as the year goes on… I know I already have..."

Without waiting for an introduction, McGonagall, who was absolutely beaming at all the new faces in the hall, stood up in her chair. "Thank you, professor. I'm delighted to—"

"Now here's to another fruitful year with my favourite group of students!" Professor Albus Dumbledore rose his goblet in the air to commemorate the start of the semester. McGonagall was forced to sit back down as the four houses of the Great Hall offered their shared enthusiasm by raising their cups to join the toast. As usual, dozens of candles floated above the heads of the ravenous students, who had only just disembarked from the Hogwarts Express, while the multi-course meals began popping into existence from table to table.

Within seconds, Ron had already begun to tear the skin off a leg of chicken, a sight which made Hermione wince. Harry, on the other hand, was having trouble finding his appetite. "Hey guys," he started. "Don't you think it's weird that Dumbledore is acting all normal even though Volde—"

"Harry!"

"Even though, _you know who_ is probably out and about and plotting the various ways he can kill me."

Hermione peered into the dish full of porked cow belly in front of her and gagged. Tapping her fingernails on the wooden table, she settled on pulling out her wand and pointing it at the dish. " _Iamnus Veganus_!" The meat dish flashed green as the bones began to melt. Before long, flesh and bone morphed to lettuce and the cow belly delight had been transformed into a more standard salad.

"Hermione!" Ron whined. "You need to ask before you veganize everything. I was going to eat that!"

Hermione dug her fork in and began chomping down. "It's for the best, Ron. You think this cow asked to be made into a meal?"

Under his breath, Ron mumbled, "He definitely didn't ask to be made into a salad."

Hermione turned to Harry to address his original query. "I'm sure Dumbledore has his own plans but is holding on to them because he doesn't want to freak out the other students. Better to be calm in times like this. I mean, look at him."

Harry looked over to the head table where the headmaster and professors sat. Something was off. He scanned the seats until he arrived at a large gap between professors. Hagrid's seat was empty; he must not have arrived from the alternate journey yet. In the middle of the table, Dumbledore appeared to be having the time of his life. Was he drunk? He twirled his wand in his long aging fingers and half shouted, half spat, " _Pyromaniacus_!" A series of flames erupted from the tip of his wand and danced into his goblet. "Look, Harry!" Dumbledore seemed rather pleased with himself. "It's a goblet of fire! On second thought..." He hastily muttered a second spell to extinguish the flames. "That's probably a bit too soon."

When the students looked as if they had had their fill of the great meal, Dumbledore withdrew his wand once more, made a long sweep across the hall, vanishing the dirty dishes and scraps of food entirely. He swept his arm again which lifted the tables into the air, letting them flutter for a moment, before they disappeared with a pop. Still glued to their seats, the students could only watch in amazement. "Now," he began. "Who's ready for the first dance of the year?" He leapt over the head table and motioned for Professor McGonagall to join him.

Before he had time to assume his traditional ballroom stance, the doors of the great hall burst open.

"Waaaaaade in the water… God's gonna trouble the waaaaaater," Hagrid entered the hall to rapturous applause. "Thank you, and thank you." The hall, which had suddenly been filled with the curious clamours of pupils wondering where Hagrid had been all this time, suddenly began to quiet down when they realized he was not alone.

Barry and company stepped out from behind him.

Ice Cube was shaking his head, "He's been singing this song non-stop for the past few hours."

"It doesn't help that he only knows the one verse," Mr. Jackson added.

Buggin' Out was twitching his head around the room excitedly. "Are we in time for the meal?"

Without missing a beat, Professor Dumbledore glided across the Great Hall's floor (which had since been transformed into a ballroom floor) and reached out his arm to shake the hands of each of the visitors. "Well, what do we have here? I wasn't aware that we had even more new students?" He glanced nervously at Professor McGonagall who could only shrug her concern. Behind her, Severus Snape stood with his arms crossed, sizing up the new visitors with his cold, pointed gaze.

Snape slowly approached Hagrid and grimaced. "Why do you smell like that, Rubeus?" he asked, not looking particularly impressed.

Snoop Dogg looked at the ceiling.

"Oh you know, I think we came across a skunk on our journey—oh, would you look at the time, I best be off the bed. It was swell!"

Hagrid spun around, nearly knocking Barry over once again with his massive arms, and stumbled out of the hall.

Barry, who hadn't had much of a chance to voice his opinion since he had started his journey, suddenly became very aware of the silence between his friends, and the rest of Hogwarts. He spoke up, "When do we find out what house we belong to?"

Dumbledore slowly lowered his eyes to face the eleven year old. "Oh, yes. Perhaps we could do that now. Only… I may need a few minutes to get the sorting hat… ready. Do you mind entertaining our guest for just a moment, Minerva?"

Taken aback by the request, Professor McGonagall quietly looked over the group. "Welcome to Hogwarts, School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I assume you're all here to join the help—"

"Motherfucka!" yelled Mr. Jackson. "We didn't come all this way to be your invisible house slaves. Don't you people already have enough of those?"

"... to join the help we require to ensure that Hogwarts reputation of excellence is upheld," McGonagall finished.

Buggin' Out whispered to Barry, "That's an awfully weird way to word a sentence."

 _SNAP_.

Dumbledore apparated in front of Barry who exclaimed, "When do I get to learn that?"

With a grin on his face, and the aging Sorting Hat under his arm, Dumbledore made his way to the centre of the Great Hall.

"Students, although we did our selection ceremony several hours ago, certain circumstances prevented our new friends from attending. But no bother, they are here now so let us open our arms and make our families bigger!" He threw the Sorting Hat into the air which then landed onto a stool that seemed to materialize through the floor.

"Now, who's first?"

Without waiting his turn, Barry ran right over to the stool, picked up the Sorting Hat, and slammed it down on his head. Please be Gryffindor, he thought to himself. Please let me be in the same house as Harry Potter. The other students began to crowd and make a circle around Barry, curious about the hat's upcoming selections.

The Sorting Hat tensed its lips, appearing to be in deep thought. "Well, this is a tricky one. But there can't be any doubt that this young man belongs in… Gryffin—"

"Ahem!" Dumbledore coughed into his drooping wizard sleeve.

"Oh, right." The Sorting Hat seemed to remember something. "Well, hmmm… it's a very tough call but I think that this young man belongs in… House Negus!"

The other houses burst into a muffled chatter. Cube nudged Buggin' Out. "Do you remember them talking about a House Negus in that Hogwarts documentary?"

Buggin' Out was on his handheld again, "Nope, but then I wasn't paying that much attention either."

Somewhere between surprised and confused, Barry carefully removed the Sorting Hat and sat it back down on the stool.

The hat yelled out, "Next!"

Ice Cube stepped into the centre of the circle and picked up the hat.

"Hmmm," the hat pondered, "This is another toughy, a lot of things to consider and all—House Negus!"

Cube removed his hat and raised an eyebrow. Shaking his head, he stepped out of the circle to join Barry. "Man, I don't know about this."

Next, Mr. Jackson approached the hat.

"Negus!"

"The fuck? I didn't even put the hat on!" Jackson exclaimed.

The Sorting Hat shifted uncomfortably. "Oh… of course… I got a bit ahead of myself there. Just… yes, that's it, put me on your head… just like that… and let me think long and hard about this one… Negus! Next!"

Professor Dumbledore motioned towards Dean Thomas. "And what about you m'boy? Want a turn with the Sorting Hat?"

The curly haired star Quidditch player was taken aback. "Me?" he pointed to himself. "But Professor, I've been in Gryffindor for the past four years."

Dumbledore twirled the end of his beard. "Yes, yes but better to be sure about these things. You never know…"

Dean stepped toward the stool and cautiously approached the hat.

"I have to do this," the hat whispered.

"I know," Dean replied, as a lone tear ran down his cheek, matching the speed at which the hat sunk across his face.

And so it was. By the time the Sorting Hat was placed down for the last time, Barry and his friends (and Dean) had all been sorted into the House of Negus. Though Barry had been hoping to be a part of the famous Gryffindors, he figured that he would be seeing them around the school grounds enough anyways. And besides, he supposed, by this time tomorrow he'd have his very own wand, maybe even have learned a spell or two, and would be one step closer to making something of himself. Things weren't so bad. Inside the Hogwarts castle, he felt safer than he had been for a long time and even though he had missed the dinner, he couldn't quite wrap his head around the fact that they'd be served a buffet breakfast in the morning (he couldn't remember the last time he had an option for breakfast other than cereal). Though he did miss his mother, he knew that she would want him to be out in the world instead of struggling in front of a chalkboard. And even if the House of Negus wasn't exactly what he was expecting, and seemed rather small compared to the other houses now that he thought about it, at least all of his friends were still together. And that was something he could hold on to.


	5. Chapter 5

**Black Lives, Dark Matter**

"It could be a lot worse." Barry rested his suitcase down as the newly anointed House of Negus members began dropping their belongings on the floor of their new pad. After being segregated by the Sorting Hat, Professor McGonagall escorted the group out around the back of the Hogwarts campus, and down a staircase that appeared to run deeper into the ground than the entrance to the House of Slytherin's did. The common area looked essentially like an unfinished basement; there was no carpeting, it felt cold and damp, and the amount of spiders crawling around the decaying furniture led Barry to believe that this was the first time in quite a while that anyone had been down here.

"Tell me how this could be a lot worse. Goddamn." Ice Cube walked over to the fireplace, which was effectively a bed of webs and host to some sort of nest that appeared to have three apple-sized unhatched eggs. "Aw hell naw. We need some house elves up in this shit."

Dean Thomas stepped out of one of the rooms looking completely devastated. "Four to a room… I went from having my own bed, my own desk, and my own washroom… to four to a room?"

Mr. Jackson heartily slapped him on the back. "When I was growing up, it was four to a bed!"

Cube mumbled, "I guess you didn't sleep in the same bed as yo mama then."

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. "Who the fuck wants to visit us at this hour?" Cube reached for the doorknob just as the visitor decided to open the door himself.

"Good evening, neighbours." Draco Malfoy stood in the doorway with his two cronies, Crabbe and Goyle, backing him up. "Just thought we'd see how you were adjusting to your new digs." He looked up at the spiderweb covered ceiling that Mr. Jackson was attempting to clean out with a broomstick. "I bet you all must feel right at home."

Cube took a step forward and Draco winced. "Nigga, I don't have a piece on me but if I ever see you in the streets, we're gonna have some words. You hear me?"

Draco tapped Crabbe on the shoulder. He leaned over and whispered something into his ear. "I think we'd better leave our new friends to it then. Our PS4 awaits. I'd say see you boys on the Quidditch pitch but you aren't allowed to play Quidditch if you can't afford broomsticks. And that one doesn't count." He nodded at the one Mr. Jackson was using to clear the cobbs just as Cube slammed the door in his face.

"Man, fuck that stuck-up cracka." Cube put his hands on his hips as he surveyed the room. "He is right though, we need to get our hands on some broomsticks if we're going to wipe his ass at Quidditch."

Barry pulled on the sleeve of Mr. Jackson. "Can we afford to buy them?"

Mr. Jackson looked down at Barry. "We'll figure it out."

Buggin' Out, who had claimed a corner of the slightly crusty couch in front of the fireplace, exclaimed, "What I want to know is how we can get our hands on a PS4 if they've got one."

"The Malfoy family is rich as fuck," Cube replied. "I've never met them and can already tell by his accent."

"Well, we need some of that magic shit ASAP," Buggin' Out shoved his Game Boy into his pocket. "If we're going to be living in this shithole for the next eight months, we ain't gonna survive without some form of entertainment."

"First things first," said Cube as he held up one of the purple robes they had acquired as part of their induction. "I'm hungry as shit and not going to no four-person bedroom without dinner."

Mr. Jackson crossed his arms. "There's no way you're out there at this hour."

"Relax, I'm just going to pay those house elves a visit. Anyone who wants to can come along. Snoop, are you down?"

Snoop Dogg exhaled. "Lead the way, nephew."

"What do you mean you have to do all the cooking and cleaning for less than minimum wage?" Cube passed the joint to Dobby. It had only taken a few minutes, since entering the underground kitchen, before Snoop had started up a smoke circle consisting of him, Cube, and several of the Hogwart's house elves. Dobby had been eagerly catching them up on the history of his species and their involvement at the school.

"It is the way of the house elves, Master Cube," Dobby replied, while taking another inhale.

"That's some serious bullshit." Cube looked around at the bustle and yet, highly efficiently organized chaos, of the Hogwarts kitchen. Though pots and pans seemed to pile up in the corner of the stone-tiled room, there was a kind of assembly line that was busy preparing the dishes for the upcoming morning's meal. "Why don't you just leave?"

The blunt was passed to Winky who inhaled solemnly, "Masters won't let us leave; they paid too much for Winky."

"Hold up. You know that Abraham Lincoln abolished slavery right?"

"Mr. Lincoln didn't abolish slavery for the house elves."

Through his reddening eyes, Dobby chimed in, "It's true. My great-great-great grandfather worked as Mr. Lincoln's personal house elf."

Cube blinked his head back. "Lincoln had house elves?"

"Oh yes, he freed the slaves because he no longer had any need for them—not when he could just use the house elves instead. It looked good on his part to abolish slavery even though it would cost him nothing. Win win."

Snoop, who had just finished rolling his second blunt, sent it around the circle in the opposite direction of the first one. The seated house elves nodded their appreciation in silence.

"I'll tell you what." Ice Cube stood up and removed his blue and white striped bandana. "Clothes will set you free right?"

Dobby's eyes widened upon realizing what Cube was about to do. "No… I cannot accept… Miss Granger already tried to tricky Dobby into wearing tiny hats…" But Dobby was too high to get up and stared straight ahead as Cube wrapped the bandana around his flappy elvish ears. The second blunt made it to Dobby which he eagerly accepted. He took a deep breath, "So this is what it feels like… to be free."

Dobby passed the joint on. Cube removed the bandana from around Dobby's head and tied it around the next house elf. "Repeat after me," said Cube. "House elf lives matter."

"House elf lives matter," the circle chanted as one by one they were given turns to wear the bandana.

The next morning, Dumbledore clamoured for attention at the head of the Great Hall. There was a growing restlessness among the students due to the fact that the regular morning breakfast had been delayed.

"It has come to my attention," Dumbledore began, "That several of our staff have called in sick this morning. As such, we will be unable to reach our usual high standards in dining delight... until they have resumed their duties." He waved his wand and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches filled the plates of all the students in the hall. The collective groan nearly drowned out his next sentence. "This will have to do for now," he finished.

Mr. Jackson, seated near the front of the hall with the rest of the House Negus, suspiciously eyed Ice Cube and Snoop who both looked down at the table. "Please tell me that you two niggas didn't go and mess a good thing up for the rest of us." He picked up the sandwich which fell apart in his hands. "God fucking damnit."


	6. Chapter 6

**Dimensional Derivations**

The class waited patiently while Professor Koreander paced back and forth at the front of the room. As this was the very first time this class had ever been taught, he was holding a special introductory lesson with no prerequisites—meaning that students from all years were meant to attend. Barry had the idea to show up early in order to get a decent seat but, as was usually the case, everybody else had the exact same idea. The lecture hall was now packed to capacity, hosting nearly 270 students who sat along the aisle steps once the number of seats had run out.

Buggin' Out was squished in the back next to Barry and couldn't stop fidgeting for his comfort. "Don't they have some magic shit that can make this space bigger?"

Hermione, who also was rather unlucky to show up later than the rest, overheard and replied, "Actually, there are spells that can make a room much bigger on the inside but they must be applied when the room is first being built."

Buggin' Out grimaced. "Actually, actually," he muttered.

Once the class had managed to squeeze into a decent resting spot, the student chatter eventually died down and Koreander stopped pacing.

"Well then," he began. "Hopefully, by the end of this class, you'll have learned enough about dimensions that we hold the next class in a much larger one."

The class laughed respectfully.

"I wasn't kidding," he replied. "To start, I need a volunteer. How about you?" He pointed to Barry who motioned that he didn't think it would be possible for him to descend down the aisle due to the sheer number of students. "Nonsense," said Koreander as he realized the dilemma. " _Accio_ , that kid!"

Barry felt a tingling sensation as gravity seemed to reverse itself. His clothes began tugging upward and he felt himself being pulled like a magnet up into the air, down the aisle and plopped down in front of the professor. The class gasped.

"Did he just use a summoning spell on a child?" Hermione looked horrified. "That's illegal!"

Koreander dusted off his wand. "What I'm about to show you will be at once unpleasant and aweinspiring. But I'm going to hold onto your shoulder to prevent you from falling in."

Before Barry could object, Koreander had twirled his wand to outline the edges of an oval in the air before him. Initially, a soft glow hung off the edges of the oval but said glow rapidly began to bleed inwards—crafting what appeared to be a floating door of illuminosity.

"Dimensions are a fascinating thing," Koreander explained to the class. "Much like the laws of our own universe, matter cannot be created or destroyed. If something were to be added to a dimension, something else would be taken away. Likewise, if something were to be taken away from a dimension, something just might be added."

Koreander nudged Barry forward. "Go ahead, take a look inside. Just… don't let go." Barry reached behind him and grabbed his professor's arm (which was also firmly planted onto his shoulder). This is it, he thought. I'm really a wizard now. And then he looked in.

"Can we give the poor boy some space?" Koreander was attempting to herd the students away from Barry who had screamed the moment he put his head through the door. Barry instantly took a step back, looked up at his friends, and fainted.

"Let us through!" Mr. Jackson demanded as he attempted to bound down the stairs.

" _Aguamenti_!" Water suddenly started spouting out of Neville Longbottom's wand—which he clumsily directed at Barry's face. Barry started coughing under the stream of water and began to come to. "I can't believe that worked!" Neville seemed amazed with himself.

"Boy, turn that hose off." Mr. Jackson arrived at Barry's side. "Son, what did you see?"

Barry didn't want to open his eyes.

"It's ok," Mr. Jackson continued. "You're still here with us."

Koreander waved his arm in an attempt to calm the commotion. Unfortunately, his wand's dimensional spell still seemed to be half-active and a giant glowing door was birthed above the heads of the class. The dimensional portal, which was now sinking towards the students, initiated a massive freak out. Between the screams and shouts to head for the exit, Percy Weasley, who was unenthusiastically performing his Prefect duties these days, lazily attempting to shepherd the commotion up the stairs while the younger and weaker students ended up getting trampled.

Meanwhile, Ice Cube had made it down to Barry's side and noticed a lone Neville Longbottom peering into the original dimensional doorway. "Hey fool," he called out to him. "I wouldn't do that if I were you—"

But right on cue, Neville lost his balance and fell face first through the door. Neville's final word, an elongated _Fuuuuucccccckkkkkk_ , was the last thing Cube heard—but it was ultimately drowned out by the cries of students who were unable to battle their way out of the lecture hall.

" _Confectrix_!" Dumbledore's mighty voice boomed over the partially full lecture hall as a white light shone out of his wand, tearing a hole into the expanding dimension door. The door finally broke apart, bursting into tiny pink tulips that sprinkled over the heads of the cowering students. "I miss dimension doors," he said as he tucked his wand away into his robe. Adjusting his half-moon spectacles, he scanned the room to observe the damage. "I'll send the house elves (the ones that are still with us anyways) up to give this place a clean. I think we can say, class dismissed?" He raised an eyebrow. "Professor Koreander do you mind staying back for a few minutes? I'd like to have a word."

The class began to shuffle out of the room in a somewhat more orderly fashion now that the dimension door of doom was no longer threatening to fall on their heads. Ice Cube turned to Buggin' Out.

"Yo man, that Longbottom nigga fell through the open door!"

Still preoccupied with his video game, Buggin' Out replied, somewhat dismissively, "Who?"

"Neville Longbottom. He went right through the dimension door before Dumbledore closed the two of them."

"I've never heard of him."

Cube turned to Mr. Jackson. "Did you see Neville fall through that door?"

Mr. Jackson was still preoccupied with Barry, who had only just recovered enough to get to his feet. "I don't think I've met a Neville, son. Have you heard of him, Fred?"

A man that Ice Cube had never met before was suddenly standing before him. With his red knitted sweater, and blue dress shirt, Mr. Rogers grinned from ear to ear. "Perhaps this Neville is a make believe friend."

"Make believe?" Ice Cube took a step back. "Hold up. Who the fuck _are_ you?"

Mr. Jackson patted Cube on the shoulder. "Man, leave Mr. Rogers alone. He didn't do anything to you." They reached the lecture hall exit and surveyed the hallway. Many of the older students seemed to have dispersed while the first years hung around, unsure of whether they were actually allowed to leave.

"Well, I guess that's that," Mr. Jackson declared. "Shall we go back to our dom, boys? Fred, are you cooking tonight?"

Mr. Rogers winked. "I suppose it is my turn. Isn't the sharing of responsibility a wonderful thing?"

"Oh no, uh uh, you don't live with us. Don't even start with me." Cube was starting to look panicked.

Mr. Rogers rolled his eyes. "I've always admired your ability to prank others, Ice. I suppose that's what makes you so special. By the way, do you mind if I take the top bunk tonight? The bottom one seemed to make my back stiff."

"What the fuck! I don't have a bunk bed!" Cube burst into a sprint and took off down the hallway, making a leap onto the staircase at the end, just as it snapped off and magically began to rotate.

Mr. Rogers shook his head and began to whistle a familiar tune. Outside of the conversation, and outside of his own head, Barry Little began to regret coming to this place. He had just been shown something he wished he hadn't seen and wondered if there was a spell out there that could help him take it back. He resolved to go to Dumbledore's office first thing in the morning—where he would ask if he could drop out of Hogwarts.


	7. Chapter 7

**Barry's New Wand**

The lineup to the headmaster's office stretched fifteen students from the gargoyle statue, down the hall, and around the corner, when Barry arrived the next morning. Buggin' Out, who was fifth in line, was complaining to his fellow cue colleagues.

"This is some serious bullshit. We pay tuition." He remembered his scholarship. "Well… most of us pay tuition and yet… they expect us to wait? We the people demand customer service. Unacceptable." Buggin' Out noticed Barry poking his head from around the corner to see if the line was moving. "We're not going anywhere, little man!"

Barry turned around in defeat—Charms was starting in fifteen minutes so he didn't have time to wait in line.

"Hello… yes, good morning… how do you do?" Harry Potter brushed past Barry, greeting the other young wizards in the line. He walked right up to the gargoyle and rubbed his chin. "Hmm… now, what was that password again?"

"Excuse me?" Buggin' Out snapped his fingers. "I don't know who you _think_ you are, but you ain't cutting this line."

Without looking away from the gargoyle, Harry replied, "The professor and I have very important business to discuss."

"And our business isn't important?" Barry looked up and down the line for support. "Can you believe this shit? Are ya'll just going to stand there and let him go in first?"

The students grumbled and shrugged their loose agreement. Ron Weasley, who had also been standing in line for the past fifteen minutes, came to Harry's defense.

"If Harry needs to see the Headmaster, it's probably a lot more important than anything we—"

"Ah, shut the hell up, Racist Ron," Buggin' Out spat back, not letting him finish his sentence.

"Now I remember," Harry took a step back in preparation. "Cockroach Cluster!" The gargoyle sprang to life and stepped aside. "The professor really ought to change his passwords more frequently."

"Ah hell naw," Buggin' Out ran back to the front of the line, and slipped in behind Harry just as the gargoyle slammed shut.

"I tried to tell him that you were busy, professor," Harry explained as Buggin' Out burst into Dumbledore's office—immediately becoming engrossed in the many different trinkets and strange machineries the aging wizard had collected over the years.

Buggin' Out walked right up to Dumbledore's desk (who had his nose deep in some school papers). "It's just not right that we have to wait outside but your boy gets to waltz in here whenever he wants."

"Well, I am the chosen one," said Harry.

Continuing to flip through his papers, Dumbledore nodded in agreement. "He's right, he is the chosen one."

Buggin' Out slammed his fist down on the desk. "Chosen one my ass. He has to get his biblical butt in line the next time..." He suddenly started to notice the various paintings that were hanging in the office—and the old wizards who were watching and listening in on their conversation.

"Let me ask you something, Professor D," Buggin' Out started. "How come you don't have any brothas on the wall?"

Dumbledore raised an eyebrow. "I beg your pardon?"

"I said: how come you ain't got any _brothas on the wall_? I see Armando Dippet, Heliotrope Wilkins, Vindictus Viridian… all _white_ wizards. The closest thing you've got to a negro up there is Phineas Nigellus Black and that's only because of the name! What you got against wizards of another colour?"

Dumbledore straightened his half moon spectacles and sniggered to himself. "Surely, you can't be serious."

"Hell yes, I'm serious. You're gonna group us all together, make us drink out of styrofoam cups and now you're gonna tell us that we aren't allowed to look up and see some of our own ancestry up there?"

"First of all, I don't know where you've been getting styrofoam cups… Minerva certainly wouldn't allow them on school property. And second, the issue _is_ young man, that there simply aren't that many famous black wizards."

"Like shit there aren't!" Buggin' Out whipped out his iPhone and began googling images.

"How did you get that in here?" Dumbledore looked surprised. "Technology isn't supposed to work at Hogwarts."

"Yeah, your cracker jack typewriters probably don't work here, but I'm a twenty-first century nigga. Here we go." Buggin' Out handed Dumbledore the phone. "Chris Webber, Gus Johnson, Earl Monroe, Elvin Hayes? No black wizards my ass. And that's just off the top of my head. I'd understand if you didn't want to count Michael Jordan but he at least deserves an honourable mention."

Dumbledore looked confused as he swiped through the images. "These are basketball players."

"NBA legends muthafucka. Next time I come up in here there better be some _African American_ wizards up in them portraits."

Before Dumbledore could offer a response, Buggin' Out spun around and walked out the door.

Once the door had closed shut behind him, Harry rushed over. "Professor, I had the dream again."

Dumbledore leaned forward in his chair. "You saw through his eyes?"

Harry nodded. "I know how Voldemort is going to invade Hogwarts."

Barry entered the Great Hall and spied Mr. Jackson, who was sitting by himself near the head table, poking at his breakfast with the wrong end of his spoon. He headed over to join him.

"Goddamn, porridge again? Are those house elves ever going to get better?" Mr. Jackson took a slurp of the chunky liquid (that seemed to be swirling on its own accord) and coughed. "Goddamn." Barry swung his legs over the bench and sat down. "How are you doing, little man?"

Barry silently reached for the nearest bowl (which was instantly populated by the same swirling plop) and began poking it himself.

"Listen, kid." Mr. Jackson put his spoon down; it sank into the mixture and was never to be seen again. "I don't know what frightened you in that dimensional class and you don't have to tell me—we've all seen enough fucked up shit. But you ought to know that your mother told me she's really proud of you. You're the first person in her family to not only get a scholarship, but to travel around the world! How about that!"

Barry continued to prod at his meal.

"You're also the first person in her family to become a wizard."

Barry's eyes lit up and Mr. Jackson grinned to himself.

"And I bet you're excited to get your first wand today. I'm pretty curious to see what I'll get to."

Barry began to chow down on his dish. "You'll get something good," Barry replied. "The right wand always chooses the right wizard."

"I'll bet, son…" Mr. Jackson trailed off as Ice Cube joined the table. "Excuse me." Mr. Jackson folded up his newspaper and left.

"Is that nigga still giving me the silent treatment? He needs to chill the fuck out."

Through a mouthful of porridge, Barry replied, "He says you ruined breakfast for him."

Cube grabbed Jackson's abandoned dish and started scarfing it down. "I didn't do nothin' that shouldn't have been done a hundred years ago." He suddenly push his dish down to watch the group of Gryffindors that was coming towards them. Fred and George Weasley appeared to have crafted together some sort of technicolour spider-tronic tray holder which was dancing down the hall as it carried Mr. Rogers' breakfast. The students were having a hoot as it danced towards the table.

As it passed the space where Harry, Ron, and Hermione were having their breakfast, George Weasley decided to poke fun at his younger brother. "I hope we painted this the right colour for you, Ronnie." He motioned towards the spider's rainbow-highlighted legs.

Ron nearly choked on his milk. "Hey, what's that supposed to mean?"

"Not much. Just try to be more tolerant of others, eh?"

Ron stood up. "Ok, I want to know who's been spreading this rumour that I'm—"

Hermione tugged on his sleeve. "Oh, sit down. They're just teasing."

Mr. Rogers picked up the tray off the contraption and took his seat. "Alright, well done boys. We made it."

"See you in potions, Fred," said Fred Weasley.

"No, I'll see _you_ in potions, Fred," said Mr. Rogers. They shared a hearty laugh together.

Buggin' Out joined the House Negus table, taking notice of Ice Cube giving Mr. Rogers the stink eye from the other side of the room. "Man, what you got against Mr. Rogers anyways?"

Without breaking his gaze, Cube replied, "Don't you think it's weird that, we ain't hear nothin' about this Rogers guy and all of a sudden... he just appears?"

"He introduced himself to us on our first day though."

"Shut the fuck up. I only met that nigga after Longbottom fell through the dimension door…"

"Longbottom again? You're tripping man." Buggin' Out shook his head. "Mr. Rogers is goddamn delightful."

Ice Cube pushed the dish away and hurriedly left the table—he needed answers. Perhaps Koreander was the man to give them.

"Normally students are required to purchase their first wand at Ollivanders _before_ the semester begins." Professor Filius Flitwick had spread out five wands on a long table at the front of the class. "But I've been told to make an exception for our… last minute additions."

Barry sat wide-eyed at the front of the class. It took everything he could muster to prevent himself from leaping out of the chair, grabbing the wand and yelling some latin sounding incantation he had made up on the spot. Still, he managed to resist the urge.

"Each wand is unique," the Charms professor began, "So much so that they can feel like an extension of one's own arm. To use a wand that does not belong to oneself can result in dire consequences." Without waiting for Flitwick's go ahead, Ice Cube and Buggin' Out had already helped themselves to the wands and struck a fighting stance.

" _Lumos_ bitches!" Ice Cube cried out.

"Boys no!" Flitwick looked horrified. "Never use a wand that hasn't agreed to be used." He snatched the wands out of their hands. "Ouch!"

Cube crossed his arms. "Aw, c'mon we were just playin'."

Flitwick sighed and handed them both back the same wands. "Your wands just stung me… that's as good an indication as any that chosen taken a new owner."

"Goddamn right, good boy wandy. Electrocutin' any cracka that tries to lay a hand on ya."

"I wouldn't start the celebration too early," Flitwick warned while pulling his own wand out of his trousers. "Because even though the wand technically belongs to you, it did not react at all when you yelled out _lumos_..." A bright light exploded at the tip of Flitwick's wand, glowing brighter for a few seconds, before dissipating back to dullness. "... which is something Professor Dumbledore had previously warned us about…"

Buggin' Out jumped in the air. "Hah! I guess Cube's shootin' blanks. Watch and see how it's done." He bent his knees and pointed the wand at Cube. " _Avada Kedavra_!"

Flitwick screamed out as the entire class threw themselves on the ground.

"Weird," Buggin' Out tapped the end of the seemingly lifeless wand. "I thought something was supposed to happen."

Lying on the ground with the rest of the students was Mr. Jackson, who nervously stood up, and scanned the room to make sure everything was as it should be. "Are you too niggas out of your mind?"

Buggin' Out lowered his wand. "I was just—"

"Get your ass to Dumbledore's office right now!" snapped Mr. Jackson.

Flitwick recovered himself and quickly stepped in. "Hey, I'm the professor here. I'll be the one to give the orders."

"Do I look like I give a damn?" Mr. Jackson's forehead veins were bulging. "I have half a mind to send you to his office too!"

"You can't send me to—"

"Get your ass to his office!"

"I don't believe it," Draco Malfoy cut in.

Flitwick held up his arm. "Stay out of this Draco unless you want to fail Charms yet again."

Draco continued anyways, "They're all a bunch of Muggles!"

Flitwick opened his mouth to reply but took a step back and turned away instead. "Stay out of this Draco…" he said wearily.

Mr. Jackson put his hand on Flitwick's shoulder. "Hey man, do you know something we don't because we—"

"Muggles! Muggles! Muggles!" Draco danced around the room.

"Hey." A dreamy voice drifted over from the back: "But are you absolutely positive they're Muggles? And how would you know for sure?" Luna Lovegood, who was the only person who chose not to duck down and brace for impact after Buggin' Out's attempted magic trick, sat up straight in her seat.

Professor Flitwick adjusted his glasses and squinted toward the back of the class. "Luna? You aren't in this class. Where did you—"

"They look like Muggles and smell like Muggles, but they're here right now which is not a very Muggle sounding thing if I do say so."

Draco lifted his nose at Luna. "Hmph. Muggle or not, I guess there are worse thing you could be. Isn't that right… you filthy mudblood."

The class cried out in support of Luna, jeering and threatening the older Slytherin who smirked at his successful instigation.

"DRACO MALFOY! 100 points from Slytherin!" Flitwick boomed. "We do not accept discrimination of any sort here at Hogwarts. Go to the headmaster's office IMMEDIATELY!"

Cube nodded and began clapping enthusiastically. "That's what I'm talking about."

Draco craned his neck at Cube and said, "Shut up, nigger."

"OH FUCK NO!"

"JESUS CHRIST, THIS BOY'S GONNA GET IT."

"YOU WANT TO SAY THAT AGAIN?"

Mr. Jackson poked Flitwick hard in the shoulder. "Hey!"

Flitwick shrugged it off. "What now?"

"Are you not going to do anything?"

"About what?"

"About what Draco just said?!"

"What difference does it make, he's already going to Dumbledore's office."

Cube threw his arms up in the air. "That is some serious bullshit."

Barry who, despite all the commotion and confrontations that were rapidly unfolding, could no longer control his impatience to try out the wand before him, stepped forward and reached out. What he failed to realize was that before class had started, Hogwart's favourite Slytherin, Draco Malfoy, had swapped one of the wands with his own. Apart from the regular reactions that wands made when held by someone other than their owner, Draco had placed an additional curse to ensure that the unlucky receiver was presented with a nasty surprise. His original intention was to get back at Cube for the embarrassment he had been forced to endure on the Hogwart's Express. But now, that punishment had been passed onto poor Barry, who slowly lifted the wand and uttered the words, " _Accio_ …"

He wasn't able to finish the sentence before everything went white.


	8. Chapter 8

**Dean Thomas Strikes Back**

"Barry?... Nurse! He's opening his eyes."

"That's a good sign."

"Don't try to move, son. Everything's going to be just fine."

The light's above him were fuzzing out the faces that seemed to hover by his bedside. Though his head was killing him (he felt like he had been hit by a truck), he felt… almost lighter. He wondered if he had been given some sort of medication—

The sudden reality of the situation hit Barry.

"Where's my arm?" Barry jolted upright in the bed, turning stark white as his empty right sleeve drooped to his side. "Where's my arm?"

"Nurse!"

"Hold him down!"

"Goddamn, poor Barry." Ice Cube wasn't enjoying his porridge breakfast very much. When he realized that Mr. Jackson, still holding a grudge for the house elf situation, was eyeing him up, he pretended to be enjoying it. "Mmmmmmm… can't beat this."

"Hm. Poor Barry is right," Mr. Jackson replied. "But at least we know he isn't a Muggle. Unlike you niggas."

"Hold up. You're a Muggle too."

"Really, because I don't remember using my wand at all."

"Well, go ahead then. Show us what ya got, Mr. Wizard."

Mr. Jackson tentatively withdrew the wand from the sleeve of his robe but silently tucked it back in. "It's not good manners to use magic at breakfast," he said.

"Whatever man." Ice Cube cracked his knuckles. "What I would've give to get back at Malfoy. I know his ass was expelled and all but that sucka should be in jail or something."

"He has rich parents. He'll always get off."

"Ain't it the truth."

"Excuse me, brothers," Dean Thomas slid onto the seat beside Mr. Jackson. "I couldn't help but overhear your desire to get back at Slytherin. What if I told you there was a way to do just that?"

Cube and Mr. Jackson leaned forward.

"Our own Quidditch team? Nigga, you crazy."

"Why? I was Gryffindor's star chaser. I know all of their tricks and weaknesses. Defeating them for the Inter-House Quidditch Cup would be a piece of cake."

Mr. Jackson raised an eyebrow. "I thought this was about getting back at Slytherin."

Dean nodded enthusiastically. "It is… Team Slytherin is made up of a bunch of pussies so we'd easily hand it to them."

Dean had brought Cube and Mr. Jackson to a custodial closet beside the first-floor girl's bathroom. Here, he had collected a series of old broomsticks that appeared to be vibrating on their own. "Don't mind them," he said, when he noticed that Cube and Mr. Jackson were nervously staring at the tremoring sticks. "They just don't like being cooped up in small spaces."

"Listen, son." Mr. Jackson put his hand on Dean's shoulder. "Do you really want a pack of brothas representing some aerial revenge fantasy that you've cooked up? What do you think this is, _Remember the Titans_? Even _if_ those broomsticks didn't look like they were on the verge of having an epileptic fit, and we somehow didn't manage to kill ourselves flying those things, the fact is, our numbers are just too damn small. We don't have enough players for a team. And that's the double truth, Ruth."

As they exited the broom closet, the door to the girl's bathroom burst open. Luna Lovegood, clutching her textbooks tightly to her chest seemed out of breath. "It appears that Moaning Myrtle was perving out on me again," she said. "Do you think she got the adjective in her name because that was the last thing she did before she died? I really should stop using this bathroom."

The momentary disappointment in Dean's face, brought on by Mr. Jackson's lack of enthusiasm for his plan, suddenly washed away as an idea came to him. He put his arms around Luna. "Hey kid," he began. "How would you like to play some Quidditch with us?"

Luna, whose spectral dottiness had taken her to another plane of enlightenment in the few seconds since she had exited the bathroom, suddenly arrived back on Earth. "For fun?"

"You're barking up the wrong tree, Dean," Mr. Jackson warned.

Dean continued, "No, professionally. As part of our house team."

Luna looked to the stars. "They only let me say the words though. As a Quidditch commentator, my words travel through the ears and after lives of fans everywhere. But as a Quidditch player… my actions would live on in the hearts and minds of future generations."

Cube blinked. "Have you been hanging out with Snoop?"

"So you'll join us?" Dean asked again.

Luna nodded slowly. "I already have."

"Perfect!" Dean clapped his hands together. "I only need twenty more players."

Mr. Jackson laughed. "Nigga, if you find twenty more players like that, we'll all join your team!"

Buggin' Out stared out at the freshly cut Quidditch pitch. He planted the handle of his broomstick (that still appeared to be shaking) into the ground. The team uniforms that Dean had picked out for them was way too tight—Buggin' Out was having to constantly unwedge his shorts every time he took a step. He glared over at Mr. Jackson and Cube. "You too _had_ to get involved."

Cube raised his hands up. "Don't look at me. Mister 'if you find twenty more brothas, we'll play' is to blame."

Mr. Jackson lowered his head.

In actuality, it hadn't taken Dean very long to assemble the rest of the team. Snoop, who always seemed agreeable no matter the question, enrolled without a second thought. It was actually on Snoop's suggestion that Dean was inspired to ask some of the newly freed house elves if they'd be interested in joining. Still wanting to express their eternal gratitude to their liberators (and the additional promise of a toke session following each of the matches), they wholeheartedly signed up for tryouts.

As none of the members of Team Negus, besides Dean of course, had ever ridden a broomstick before, the majority of their introduction to Quidditch was spent just trying to remain airborne. As it happened, Cube, Mr. Jackson, and Buggin' Out were already quite adept at scoring the Quaffle through the goalposts due to their history with an older Muggle sport. The house elves, on the other hand, didn't seem to take direction very well—now that they had embraced their new freedom and were unwilling to work for a master again, they were having some trouble understanding the concept of receiving orders from a team captain.

"Just try to hit me with that Bludger," Dean pleaded to Dobby during one of their training sessions.

"Why don't you make, Dobby?" the house elf replied through a puff of smoke, before flying off into the sunset.

No matter the team's overall performance, Dean was convinced that they had enough scoring power to edge out their opponents. And if not, he knew at the very least that it would make his former Gryffindor team members' blood boil to see him wearing a different coloured uniform.

The crowd erupted into cheers as Team Ravenclaw, in their blue and gold uniforms, stepped out onto the pitch, waving merrily at their adoring fans.

"Showtime," said Cube. He turned to Mr. Jackson. "Is Barry coming to watch?"

Mr Jackson shook his head. "He hasn't left his hospital bed for weeks. All he does is study every damn day and every damn night."

Cube lowered his voice. "And his arm?"

"It's not looking good. They tried to regenerate it using this charmed foam stuff but it didn't stick. It just bubbled out the second it started to look like something."

"Right." Silence sat for a moment between the two. "Well, let's win one and go check on him after."

Dean cleared his voice and turned around to face his team. "Alright guys! I don't know about you but I'm ready to Raven claw our way to victory!" The team stared at him blankly as he chuckled at his own joke. "Now listen, I know we haven't had as much time to prepare as our competitors, but I truly believe that we have the advantage here. I know their moves and they don't know ours. If we stick to the plays we learned this should be a lock. Dobby, you're up first as Seeker."

Dobby nodded his head and saluted the team captain. Dean suddenly noticed the house elf's reddened eyes. Before he could put two and two together, the smell hit him as well.

"Dobby, are you high?" Dean had lost his calm composure and suddenly looked panicked.

The house elf shook his head. "I'm a [6] at most."

Dean scanned around the room. The eyes of all the other house elves had also turned to a darkened red.

"Goddamnit, is everyone on this team blazed?"

Winky pulled on Dean's sleeve. "You promised us a toke session before each match," the house elf reminded him.

"I promised you a toke session _after_ each match!"

"Oh… this makes a lot more sense."

"God fucking damnit. Jesus fuck. I hate all of you."

The pitch whistle blew which meant it was time for the team to mount their broomsticks and head into the sky.

"Goddammit," Dean repeated. "Well, we'd all better hope we don't get randomly drug tested. If we lose today, God help all of you. And if I catch… what the fuck? Are you still smoking? Give me that!" He threw the joint on the ground and stomped on it. "You know in the professional league if they catch you with shit like this, you get sent to prison! Is this stuff really worth being sent to Azkaban with the Dementors over?"

Dobby squinted and held his hand up to his lips, already forgetting that he was no longer holding the spliff between his fingers. "Dobby heard that the Dementors suck the soul right out of your dick."

The familiar voice of Lee Jordan boomed throughout the stadium as Team Negus took to the skies.

"WELCOME BACK TO THE START OF ANOTHER SEASON OF INTER-HOUSE QUIDDITCH!" Lee began reminiscing about the highlights of the previous year. Though he was meant to provide a brief overview of each player as they circled the pitch, he momentarily fell silent upon the sight of three flying house elves, who seemed to be holding hands as they navigated their brooms side by side. They chanted together, "Damn, it feels good to be a gangster."

Lee resumed the commentary: "AND MAKING THEIR SURPRISING, BORDERLINE MIRACULOUS DEBUT, HERE ARE THE TRUE UNDERDOGS OF THE SEASON… TEAM NEGUS!"

Cube, who had started to get the hang of broom handling, leaned his weight forward to pick up speed. He zipped past the commentator box and around the three hooped goal posts on Ravenclaw's end. "What what?" he shouted, as he nearly clipped their keeper, Grant Page. Though he felt like he was putting on a much better show than the Ravenclaw's did when they first entered the airspace, the audience didn't seem to be showing much enthusiasm for his team. he circled back to Mr. Jackson who was going to be starting as a keeper.

"Man, I don't like the way that announcer introduced us," Cube said as he slowed down his broom—the other players had begun to take their starting positions.

"I thought it was fine," replied Mr. Jackson.

" _Surprising_? _Borderline miraculous_? That sound fine to you?"

"It's just a show, nigga. Goddamn, everything offends you."

Cube shook his head as the referee blew the starting whistle. "I'll show them motherfuckin' underdogs…" he muttered under his breath.

"AND THEY'RE OFF!"

Anthony Goldstein and Michael Corner, the two Ravenclaw beaters, didn't waste any time. Seeking to get back at Luna's betrayal for switching teams, they immediately directed their attention to the Bludgers that had been let loose above the pitch.

"GOLDSTEIN APPEARS TO BE HOLDING ONE OF THE BLUDGERS. THAT'S NOT LEGAL IS IT?"

Goldstein began to circle around the pitch, ignoring the Negus chasers who had already managed to score the first point, whipping past the towers of screaming (and slightly confused) fans until he was gaining on Lovegood. Luna, who seemed to be merrily drifting along, not quite aware of the fact that as a chaser, she was meant to be chasing the Quaffle, didn't notice the speed at which Goldstein was speeding towards her. Letting go of his broomhandle, he lifted the Bludger into the air with both hands behind his head and thrusted as hard as he could.

"Denied sucka!" Out of nowhere, Cube cut in front of the Bludger and whacked it with the tail of his broom. It rebounded so quickly that Goldstein was unprepared for it and ended up taking the full force of it directly to his skull. He was knocked out upon impact and slipped off his broom. The crowd went berserk.

"OHHHHHH NEGUS, _PLEASE_!"

Cube twitched and circled around to the commentator's booth. He called over at Lee, "Yo man, I do _not_ feel comfortable with you saying that shit." Lee nodded and threw up his hands to make a gang sign. "What the fuck?" Cube didn't have time to continue the thought as a yellow glimmer of light buzzed past his ear.

"CHANG HAS SPOTTED THE SNITCH!"

The walnut-sized golden sphere fluttered its way to the other side of the arena. Cho Chang, the star seeker who had only recently lost her lover Cedric, was out for blood. She leaned forward on her broomstick, pushing herself faster across the pitch until the audience faces passing her by turned to a blur and the only sound she could hear was the flapping of the snitch's wings.

Meanwhile, Mr. Jackson noticed Dobby chugging along on his broomstick, making a figure eight around one of the goal posts. "What the fuck are you doing, man?" Jackson yelled. "The snitch is loose!"

Dobby lifted a joint he had hidden behind his ear. He snapped his fingers to create a small flame and began inhaling.

"If Dean catches you with that, he's going to throw you off the team! If you don't go after the snitch right now, I'm gonna to report yo ass."

"Snitches get stitches," Dobby spoke wisely as he blew a ring of smoke through the hoop post. He grabbed onto the upper handle of his broomstick and pivoted forwards. He sank into a dive that initially started slow, but rapidly began to pick up speed as the distance between Dobby and the ground decreased.

"WHAT IS HAPPENING? THE HOUSE ELF APPEARS TO HAVE LOST HIS MIND!"

At the last minute though, Dobby lifted his broomstick into an arc, letting go of the handle and actually standing up on the broom itself, surfing through the air in some unknown glory, and leapt off.

Cho, who was so preoccupied with the snitch's movements that she didn't notice a house elf flying direct towards her, yelped when Dobby landed on her broomstick, clutching the snitch in his right hand.

As the crowd of students collectively lost its shit in a roar of applause and cheers, Cho had no choice but to lower her broomstick back to the earth, acting as a sort of descending podium for the proud house elf.

On the ground, Buggin' Out was pumping his fist into the air. Though he spent the entirety of the ten-minute long game on the bench, he was ecstatic to see Ravenclaw defeated, especially after discovering that they had an Xbox One and refused to let him join their gaming parties.

"Dobby is the champion," Dobby announced. But as he re-reached for the blunt behind his ear, his hand was caught by the Quidditch referee.

"I'm issuing Team Negus a game loss for the use of narcotics." He waved a purple card into the air and the crowd's cheers fell silent.

Dean Thomas touched down with a huge smile on his face—until he noticed the referee's card. "Hey, what's going on here? Oh... fucking shit." He didn't need to see the spliff in Dobby's hand—the smell was overwhelming.

"IT APPEARS THAT… TEAM NEGUS HAS BEEN ISSUED A LOSS!"

The crowd started booing as Cube and Mr. Jackson both disembarked from their brooms.

Cube scanned the crowd. Aside from the shouting and cursing, the angry faces, and the throwing of drinks, he could've sworn he saw a glimmer of something moving just behind the stands. For a fraction of a second, a purple glint shot out of the audience and towards the Ravenclaw goal post. Cube blinked but it was gone. It was probably nothing, he decided.


	9. Chapter 9

**The Pass**

"You should have seen us, Barry! We were beatin' Bludgers and and knockin' those punk ass Ravenclaws off their broomsticks! Can't say I'm cool with that Lee Jordan guy though." Ice Cube was sitting on the edge of Barry's hospital bed. Barry had his nose buried in Achievements in Charming from before Cube had walked in with the other team members. "And you should have seen Luna's perfect setup. Bam! Right in the kisser! And then this sucka is getting high out of his mind and STILL manages to catch the snitch."

The slightly sobered up house elf bowed. "Dobby can focus better when he is at an [8]."

The door to the hospital wing swung open. Though Dean Thomas was noticeably peeved after the referee made the decision to award them a game loss, he entered the room with a huge grin on his face.

"Let me make one thing clear," Dean started. The room fell silent. "And that is: I hate all of you." The house elves cleared a path as he made his way into the centre of the room. "But I also love all of you. We've had forty applications to join Team Negus since our match ended."

The room erupted into cheers. Even Barry, who was pretending to not be interested in their match, started to crack a smile.

Winky shouted. "Winky thinks this calls for a puff with the magic dragon!"

Dean held up his hand to simmer the room. "Actually, that's the other thing I wanted to say. They gave us a game loss today but really that was just a warning. If any of us fail a drug test, they're ejecting us from the league."

Dobby crossed his heart. "Dobby swears to never do drugs during game time anymore."

Mr. Jackson chuckled. "Brotha, you can't do drugs period. A random test means they can test you whenever they want."

The house elf's eyes widened. "You mean Dobby can no longer hit the blaze after a game?"

"And before a game," Dean quickly added. "Especially not before. Jesus Christ."

The house elf's spirits dampened as he slumped down to his knees on the cold hospital floor. "Dobby was never really free... was he."

Cube slapped Dean on the back. "So what's next? Another round of tryouts?" he exclaimed excitedly.

"There won't be any of that, Mr. Cube." The low, slithering voice of Severus Snape sneaked up behind them. At once, Team Negus collectively turned to face the Potions Professor. "The Headmaster has asked me to deliver a message."

Still cross from his earlier encounter in Dumbledore's office, Buggin' Out snapped back, "Tell that reverse colourblind portrait hanger that he can deliver the message himself!"

Snape kissed his teeth. "Unfortunately, he has other matters to attend to."

"Of course he does."

"The message is as follows," Snape unrolled a scroll of parchment which appeared to fall out of his sleeve. "It has come to the attention of the Hogwart's staff that certain members of House Negus have not been meeting the minimum grade point average that is required to participate in extracurricular activities. As such, the students known as…" He looked over the names slowly and winced. "... Ice Cube and Buggin' Out are prohibited from Quidditch until further notice. With that being said… if the aforementioned agree to focus solely on their studies, they will be rewarded with a twenty percent mark increase at the end of the year." Snape rolled up the scroll and snapped his fingers. The scroll instantly burst into flames and shriveled, creating a small pile of ashes on the floor once it was completely incinerated. "The end," he said before gliding out of the room.

The Quidditch members stared at each other, not wanting to be the one to break the silence. Finally, Dean Thomas raised his voice. "This has nothing to do with grades. Fucking Gryffindor wins the House Cup every year and now that they see there's a slight chance of competition, they want to rig the game. Eff that."

Buggin' Out shrugged. "Maybe they are. But a twenty percent bonus? You can't just walk away from that."

"In fairness," Mr Jackson started, "We did come here to learn. So it might do some good for you two to buckle down and get your grades back up. Maybe that Hermione chick can help ya'll with your revisions."

"What I want to know," said Cube, "Is how Snoop has higher marks than me. On account of the fact that I've never seen him sober."

Snoop grinned (it looked as if smoke was going to start coming out of his ears). "I'm a genius, nephew."

Meanwhile, on the seventh floor of Hogwart's, in the Gryffindor common room, Harry Potter paced back and forth.

"Where is she?" Harry asked Ron, who was busy splitting wood for the fireplace. Harry's Godfather, Sirius Black, was due to make an appearance at any minute but Hermione, who was a critical part of their plan to stop Voldemort, was nowhere to be seen.

"I haven't seen her since breakfast so I wouldn't know," Ron replied.

"Well, you should know. She is your girlfriend."

Ron sighed heavily, "She never sends me post by Owl anymore."

"Maybe because we all live together."

"She doesn't sleep in my bed anymore."

"You could probably improve your hygiene a bit."

"What do ya mean?"

"You had a pet rat for like ten years."

Suddenly, the portrait of the Fat Lady (which doubled as the entrance to the common room) slid aside.

"Hermione, it's about time… oh, hello Fred."

Mr. Rogers waved hello at the two boys and headed towards the staircase that led to their rooms.

"I guess she's not coming," Harry relented.

"Who's not coming?" A scruffy, worn-out face suddenly appeared in the fireplace, causing a dance of embers to puff out, onto the common room carpet.

"Sirius!" both Ron and Harry exclaimed together.

"Sorry to be short but I don't have a lot of time." Sirius' eyes darted around the room to ensure they were alone. "Lupin's located a potential dimension door so he's leading the Order of the Phoenix to investigate."

Ron's eyes widened. "The Order of the Phoenix?"

"It would take way too long to explain and it's not really the kind of important information that you need to know about."

Ron looked hurt.

"So it's true then?" Harry cut in. "Voldemort's going to be using a dimension door to get into Hogwarts?"

Sirius tore into a loaf of bread. Even though the fireplace was mostly an apparition, the bread crumbs still managed to bounce out of the firebox and onto the hearth stone. "It looks that way," he continued. "But there aren't that many people in this world who know how to summon a dimension door so he'll have a hard time going through with it. Besides Dumbledore, I can't actually think of any off the top of my head."

"What about the new Dimensional Derivations teacher? He opened up a pretty big door that nearly absorbed most of the students." The event was still fresh in Harry's mind. "If it weren't for Dumbledore… well, who knows what would have happened."

Sirius rubbed his chin. "So let me get this straight. You have a teacher who specializes in dimensions. He happened to start this year. The same year that Voldemort appeared to show interest in using dimension doors as a way to get to you? Curious…"

Harry gasped. "You don't think? Professor Koreander…"

"I've never trusted him," Ron said flatly.

Harry shook his head. "Racist Ron is at it again."

"That wasn't… I wasn't…" Ron threw up his arms and stamped out of the room.

Ignoring Ron's fit, Sirius asked, "Wait, the new Dimensional Derivations teacher is a person of colour?"

"Yeah… so?" Harry looked puzzled.

"It's nothing… it's just… in my head… well, I just imagined him differently for some reason."

"I barely even described him!"

Sirius turned his head and called back at someone. "I've gotta go, Harry. Let's reconvene next week."

"Wait—"

But Sirius had already faded away into nothingness, allowing the flames, which had parted for his appearance, to tumble back into their rightful place.

Harry sighed and turned to the common room's central window. From the top of Gryffindor Tower, he could see across almost all of Hogwarts' grounds. Close to the edge of the Forbidden Forest, he spotted Hagrid's hut. As usual, a soft tower of smoke was billowing out of its chimney. He hadn't seen Hagrid in ages—not since the Great Hall's opening meal at least—and resolved to go visit him tonight. He suddenly remembered about Hermione. Where was she? She was never late and never stood them up. Why did it all of a sudden feel like he barely knew the people around him anymore? Cho Chang avoided his gaze completely when they passed in the hallways, his best friend was a racist, and his arch rival, Malfoy, had finally crossed the line that led to his expulsion. Life was changing far too quickly for Harry.

"Can I give you some advice, Harry?"

Harry spun around to see Mr. Rogers standing in the doorway of the common room.

"Fred? How long have you been standing there?"

"Since I came in, Harry. I was about to head up to my room to take a nap but noticed a head in the fireplace. I then thought to myself: how wonderful is the world that we can communicate through fire? I decided to stay for such a special occasion."

"So you heard everything?"

"My advice, Harry," Mr. Rogers continued, "Is that it's better to open a door then it is to close one." Harry stared at him blankly, not attempting in any way to hide his confusion. Mr. Rogers smiled before turning away. "You have more fans than you think you do, Mr. Potter."

"Did you see the way that Cho Chang chick looked at me?" Cube sat down at the breakfast table the following morning with another bowl of porridge. "She gave me the evil eye."

Mr. Jackson raised an eyebrow and turned the page of the Daily Prophet. "She's been doing that to everyone all damn year. You ain't special."

Cube ignored him. "Look over there. Fucking Hufflepuff. What are they whispering about? Why do they keep looking over here?"

"You're one paranoid mothafucka."

Percy Weasley approached the Negus table with his tray of food.

"Oh, here we go," said Cube.

"Don't start anything," warned Mr. Jackson.

"Good morning, gentlemen." Percy adjusted his tie. Though he was standing up straight, there was a certain nervousness to his composure that Cube couldn't put his finger on. It suddenly became obvious that Percy was avoiding eye contact with both of them. "I just wanted to say that if anybody around here gives you any trouble, you can report them to me."

Cube looked over his shoulder to make sure this wasn't some elaborate joke. "Uh, sure thing, boss," he replied as Percy walked away. "What was that all about?"

"They know about the free pass." Dean Thomas sat down next to Cube, triggering hushed jeers from the Gryffindor table. "Word travels fast at Hogwarts."

"Free pass?" Cube didn't understand.

Mr. Jackson put down his newspaper, briefly glancing with disgust at the available breakfast option. "The extra twenty percent bonus for not playing Quidditch. It may as well be a free pass. I can't imagine it's made a lot of people happy."

"Especially considering how many students at this school have zero interest in the sport," Dean added.

Cube shrugged. "Well, fuck those guys. They're offering it to me, what am I supposed to do, not take it?"

Dean and Mr. Jackson remained silent.

"Oh, so you think I shouldn't be taking this now."

"We didn't say that."

"And I bet you think that we shouldn't have taken that scholarship either? Which is a nice thing to think after the fact."

Dean leaned his head forward. "Hold up. You all got a scholarship to come here?"

Cube raised his hand. "Just shut the fuck up, Dean. We all know you were the one to tell everyone about the free pass. As if anyone else in the room would say anything. I know you're still pals with some of the Gryffindors."

"Fuck you, like I'd say anything." Dean pushed his chair away and stood up violently. He glanced over at the Gryffindor table—Fred and George Weasley were making inappropriate gestures towards them. "And you know what? I hope you keep your grades down and you're forced to take that pass. Because even IF you manage to get them up again, you're not welcome on my Quidditch team anymore."

"Your Quidditch team?" Mr. Jackson had had enough. "Boy, Cube may be dumb as shit but he's right about one thing. You need to shut the fuck up and check yo self."

"Oh, I do, do I?" Dean looked as if he was about to lose it. "Guess what? You're off the team too!"

Buggin' Out appeared with a huge smile on his face. "Hey Dean, how's it hanging—"

"You're off the team too!" Dean pounded his fist down on the table, spreading an uncomfortable silence outward until they had the attention of the entire Great Hall. He puffed air through his nostrils and stormed off.

"Power hungry, motherfucker." Cube was shaking his head.

"I hope you're happy," said Mr. Jackson as he folded up the newspaper in front of him. On the back side, a headline read, MIDNIGHT INCIDENT AT OLLIVANDERS. The lead image depicted the wand shop, which had Ministry police tape plastered over a pane of broken glass, as well as Cornelius Fudge who was standing outside the storefront, discussing the happening with two other ministry officials. "Because I for one, was just starting to…" he trailed off when he noticed Buggin' Out's food tray. "Where in Holy Mary did you get all that?"

Poached eggs. Canadian bacon. Bangers and mash. Yorkshire pudding. Sun dried tomatoes. Mr. Jackson looked down at his own porridge and then to the feast before Buggin' Out.

"Some house elves made it for me," Buggin' Out muttered quietly as he began shoveling the eggs into his mouth.

"Come again? You did not say what I thought you just said." Mr. Jackson's eyes started to bulge out of his sockets.

"It's not like I'm their masters or anything," Buggin' Out reasoned between bites, "I just… you know tell them of certain things that it would be nice if they could do and well… they were just so darn grateful that we freed them that… well…"

"So... you re-enslaved the house elves? Jesus Christ."

Cube stood up from the table and raised his hands. "Yup, this right here. Mr. Jackson can't tell me nothin' after this. And you weren't even the ones who freed them. That was me and Snoop."

"About that…. they kept referring to me as Master Cube… so yeah, I'm not so sure they can tell us apart."

"You're telling me they think that I sent them back into slavery? Hell. Fucking. No. I'm headin' downstairs double time to straighten this out. You hungry ass motherfucker."

Before Cube could storm away from the table, Mr. Rogers approached them, linked in the arm of an older lady.

"Have I introduced my grandmother to you gentlemen?" Mr. Rogers asked. "She's visiting Hogwarts to deliver my mail. Nana never did get the hang of the owl post. I suppose that's why she's so special."

Mr. Jackson stood up and said, "Pleased to meet you…"

"Augusta," the older lady replied, "Augusta Longbottom."

Cube blinked. "Hold up. Did you say Longbottom?"

"Why yes, that is my last name."

"But his name is Fred Rogers."

Augusta giggled. "Why yes, it is."

Cube glanced over his shoulder to make sure he wasn't being pranked. "And he's your grandson?"

"Fool, how many times are you gonna get them to repeat themselves," Mr. Jackson snapped. He redirected his attention to Augusta. "Your grandson is one of a kind ma'am."

"How in the living fuck is he your grandson? He looks older than you!"

Augusta gasped. "I think that someone owes a quarter to the swear jar."

"Someone is about to get their ass beat, that's what," said Mr. Jackson.

Cube threw up both his arms, let loose a wail of exasperation, and bolted out of the Great Hall.

Meanwhile, in the Headmaster's tower, a very different conversation was taking place. Dumbledore leaned back in his chair behind his desk while Professor McGonagall paced the room nervously. Hermione was standing with her arms crossed.

"That's what I told her, Headmaster," McGonagall explained. "It just isn't possible."

"Why isn't it possible?" asked Hermione. "If Dean was able to switch then why can't I?"

Dumbledore breathed heavily and stared at the young Gryffindor through his half-mooned spectacle. Weighing her request in his mind, he dug deep into his history at the school to try to imagine any negative consequences that might arise from such a decision. He came up empty-handed.

"I see no reason why Miss Granger can't be allowed to switch—"

"Surely, you must be joking, Professor!" McGonagall interrupted. "Think of the greater good! The House of Gryffindor is on track to once again bask in the glory of having the highest grade point average in the entire wizarding world! A feat that will surely be ruined if the girl leaves us!"

Dumbledore lowered his glasses and chuckled. "Surely Minerva, now you're the one who must be joking." He slowly raised his hand as a gesture that Hermione's meeting had come to an end. "Please leave us to discuss this, Miss Granger. We'll award you our decision soon... But I suspect that you have nothing to worry about." He winked and Hermione's face lit up.

Leaving McGonagall with her jaw dropped in a fit of disbelief, Hermione skipped out of Dumbledore's office, bounding down the steps and past the Gargoyle statue and accidentally ramming into Ron, who had his ear pressed up against the entrance, trying to hear their conversation.

"Ron?!" Hermione was livid. "Were you spying on me?"

"Is it true? Are you really going to be leaving us?"

Ron leaned forward to embrace Hermione but she instinctively pulled back.

"Nothing's been decided," she said, noting the relief in Ron's face before she changed her approach, "But yes… most likely, I'll be moving out of Gryffindor."

"To where? Hufflepuff."

Hermione remained silent.

"Ravenclaw?"

"..."

"Not…"

Hermione turned her back on Ron but Ron grabbed at her sleeve to prevent her from walking away. "Please tell me you aren't wanting to join House of Negus. Please tell me that Hermione."

"Ok, I won't tell you that."

"How can you want to join those people? After all we've been through together!"

Hermione yanked her arm out of Ron's grasp. "Those people? Christ, you really are Racist Ron." She brushed him out of the way and continued walking down the corridor.

"No, I didn't mean it like that," Ron called after her feebly. "I… I just… I love you."

Hermione stopped in her tracks and spun around. "We're done, Ron. You and I are DONE. You choose now to drop those three words? How about you go fuck yourself, Weasley."

Once again, she turned around and began walking away.

"Mudblood!" Ron yelled after her before he could stop himself.

Hermione momentarily paused in mid-step but lowered her head and continued anyways. She wiped her face as she rounded the corner, leaving Ron standing in front of the Gargoyle entrance as he began to realize what he had just done.


	10. Chapter 10

**A Visitor in Hogsmeade**

"What a jerk!" exclaimed Cho. "You can totally do better than that ginger shit."

"Hey," Percy piped in. "That ginger shit is still my younger brother. I don't condone his racism though."

"Do you guys need to talk the entire way? I need your heads focused on Quidditch, Quidditch, and Quidditch!"

Dean Thomas was leading Team Negus into Hogsmeade with the intention of buying new broomsticks (ones that didn't feel like they were spazzing out every few seconds). Hermione, of course, was granted her wish to switch houses and was now an official student of the House of Negus. With her departure though, she opened up the floodgates for several other students who had been feeling the itch—and wanted to see what life was like on the other side of the grass.

Though previously demoralized since he was told he would have to repeat a year, Percy Weasley no longer had aspirations to be the best Gryffindor had to offer and jumped at the chance to start over. He had never played a game of Quidditch in his life, but he was set to replace Ice Cube as beater on their team.

Buggin' Out and Cube decided to stay behind, but Snoop joined in, as well as half a dozen house elves. Cho Chang was the only outsider in their group. Though she hadn't left Ravenclaw, a fact that greatly annoyed Dean as he had protested her inclusion on this outing, Hermione had noticed her sitting alone in the Great Hall that Saturday morning and decided to invite her along.

To partially make up for the Dimensional Derivations disaster, Mr. Koreander had been tasked with escorting the students into the wizarding village. Since creating the dimension door that had nearly sucked up half of his class, he had been forced to take a more subdued approach to teaching. At Dumbledore's request, he was to focus on purely the theoreticals, meaning that his class had overnight turned into the most boring three hours one could spend at Hogwarts. Still, in his own time he was able to summon doors to keep his practice from becoming stale, even if he was unable to do so without an audience.

As if he was reading his mind, Snoop asked, "So when are you going to show us another dimension door?"

The Professor was startled out of thought. "First of all, no thank you." Snoop had extended his arm to pass him a fresh blunt. "And second, I don't think this is an appropriate setting to show off."

"Come on," Snoop continued. "Are you really going to let the Headmaster tell you what to do?"

"How did you know—"

"The whole school knows they've got you on a leash. Personally, I thought that door was one of the trippiest things I've ever seen. And trust that I've seen a lot."

Hermione joined the conversation. "I think you shouldn't have to listen to Dumbledore," she said. Cho rested her head in the nook of Hermione's shoulder, intrigued by what she had to say. "Maybe I'm a little bit biased because I've already done the entire year's worth of reading for all my classes and no longer feel challenged, but I strongly believe that the ability to see into another world, or time, or plane, can give us students the perspective that's critical to our self-development. And that's a perspective we've been missing at Hogwarts. We're cooped up in the school grounds _all_ the time. Sure, we sneak out to the Forbidden Forest every now and then and yes we get the occasional trip to Hogsmeade, but what about the rest of the world… or even beyond that? If we don't have the means to travel to space, then give us the means to travel _through_ space." Hermione handed the spliff back to Snoop. "Give us the opportunity to look through the door. I want to see what Barry saw," she finished.

Mr. Koreander sighed as they reached the entrance to the village. "What Barry saw might be different from what you might see."

Dean slapped his hands together. "Alright, now who's coming with me to find some br—" Before he could finish his sentence, the six house elves bolted off towards a red ribbon plastered storefront that looked to be having its grand opening: _Susie's Sorcery of Socks_. Dean turned to Hermione but she was already being dragged into the crowd by Cho. Snoop and Mr. Koreander were already being pulled like magnets towards _The Three Broomsticks_ leaving Dean to find Team Negus' new equipment by himself.

"We'll take another round of Butterbeer," Koreander exclaimed jollily.

The server glanced nervously at the twelve empty pint glasses in front of the dimensions professor. "Are you sure that's such a good idea?" she asked, collecting the glasses onto her tray one by one. "Would you like some water instead?"

"I want Butterbeer!" he replied, perhaps too loudly—though the pub wasn't exactly known for a quiet atmosphere, he was starting to attract the attention of the surrounding booths.

Snoop raised his hand to calm him down. "The lady's right. Let's just get some dessert."

The server leaned in to whisper to Snoop, "I hope he has a designated apparator."

"He'll be fine. We'll both take a cauldron cake."

The server smiled appreciatively. She collected the last of the glasses and walked away from their table with an extra bounce in her step.

"Being nice to people isn't that hard, nephew," Snoop started. "So what's on your mind?"

Koreander shook his head and shrugged his shoulders. His mind was preoccupied with a meeting he had just had with Ice Cube. The student had burst into his office blabbering on about some Neville Longbottom and how he was going to find him and bring him back and whether he could help or not. The professor had to calm him down by explaining to him how dimension doors worked in more detail. When one passes through a dimension door, they sometimes get a glimpse of another world, and sometimes they get a glimpse of another version of their own world. It really depends on the traveller and what state of mind they're in. If there's something in their own world or life that they can't quite let go of, then the dimension door won't allow them to travel to somewhere else until the issue had been resolved—he wasn't quite sure how it worked, but he had a feeling it had to do with keeping the balance of positive and negative energy self contained. If a boy had indeed fallen through the door (Koreander was humouring the Neville bit—he didn't actually believe Cube's story), it's possible he simply ceased to exist and was instead, replaced so that his current universe did not fall off balance.

But why did Cube remember him when nobody else did, the student continued to ask. Koreander theorized that perhaps the universe didn't have an effective way for flushing out immediate memories. It was possible that while he did remember Neville now, the memory of him might disappear altogether at some point in the future.

The two carried on their conversation for several hours. It was this interaction with students that Koreander missed, and had now been robbed of. Who would show interest in his work if he wasn't allowed to show the real thing? He looked up at Snoop.

"I'm not allowed to teach. What's the point of me even being here if I'm not allowed to teach?"

Snoop was already looking for something hard to help him roll his papers. He settled on using the table coaster in front of him. "That's rough. But you're banned from teaching at Hogwarts. We're not at Hogwarts right now though."

Koreander's eyes lit up. "What, you mean now?"

"Sure, why not?"

Dean suddenly slouched into the seat beside Snoop and groaned. He planted his head face first into the table.

"We couldn't afford the broomsticks," Dean explained wearily. "I thought maybe we'd have enough for at least one good one but apparently ten Galleons isn't even enough for the lowest tier." He buried his face in his hands as Snoop rested his hand on Dean's shoulder.

"Koreander's about to show us a magic trick," he said, winking at the professor.

"Oh, I don't care anymore," Dean replied, his voice muffled as he stared into the table.

Koreander relented and withdrew his wand. With a quick glance over his shoulder to make sure the waiting staff weren't paying attention, he motioned a quick flick until he had carved out a purple oval in thin air. The dimension door, no taller than a pint glass, was spinning so rapidly that even Dean couldn't pretend he wasn't looking between his fingers anymore. "There it is," explained Koreander. "This right here is the true gateway to finding the answers that our current universe cannot answer." The door, holding the uninterrupted attention of the three students, continued to spin before them. Koreander decided to try to impress his students and flicked his wand again. Suddenly, the dimension door began to grow.

Snoop leaned back in his seat and exhaled. "That's pretty neat, nephew. Thanks for the show."

Koreander nodded his head and said, " _Confectrix!_ " but nothing happened, and the door continued to expand. " _Confectrix!_ " Koreander repeated. Growing ever larger still, the door ignored his command.

The students leaned back and closed their eyes just as another, much deeper voice whispered, " _Confectrix_." Without a second to spare, the door popped out of existence as if it had never been.

Koreander hastily tucked his wand away into his robes. "I would have had it if only I had another minute…" His voice trailed off as he looked up at the man who had stepped in and shut down the dimension door—a fully cloaked stranger whose face was hidden in the shadows of his hood. "You should be a bit more careful showing that off," the stranger advised. "You wouldn't want the wrong person to get the wrong idea." Without waiting for a reply, the stranger sauntered away.

"Who was that?" Dean asked, just as the server returned to pour him a glass of butterbeer.

"Nobody," Koreander quickly replied with a tone so dismissive that Snoop immediately picked up on it. Before Snoop could reply however, the server leaned close to Snoop's ear and whispered something that the rest of the table couldn't hear. She made a motion with her head to the bathroom and strolled in its direction.

"I don't believe this," Dean exclaimed as Snoop stood up to excuse himself.

Snoop shrugged and said, "I'm just the designated apparater." He whistled when he noticed a familiar pair of students in a booth to themselves on the other side of the pub. "It looks like it's an A plus day for the ladies too." He headed towards the bathroom while his remaining companions spun around in their seats to see what Snoop was referring to.

"Holy shit," mouthed Dean. "Are they… snogging?"

Hermione Granger and Cho Chang had, it seemed, taken an extreme liking to each other. So much so, that they seemed to have forgotten the presence of all the other patrons of _The Three Broomsticks_ and had fully embraced, locked together in a time-stopping fit of passion that seemed to slow the beat of the music surrounding them.

"Guys," Dean whispered nervously. "I can't see their hands."

Snoop Dogg opened the door to the bathroom to the sight of the server bending over the bathroom sink. With her hair draped over her face, she stretched her arms and began to straighten out.

Snoop began to withdraw some papers from his pocket but realized something was missing. "I think I forgot my light at the table," he began, "Mind if I go back and get it?"

"It's alright," Bellatrix Lestrange replied as the Death Eater spun around, shedding out of the server's skin as a tiny flame crawled up her extended finger. "I brought mine."


	11. Chapter 11

**The Sound of Silence**

Something was changing at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. With the news of the Dark Lord's return, more and more parents were pulling their children out of the school, unwilling to take the risk of safety that Dumbledore had promised. The ones that did stay were no longer able to focus on their studies, dreading His potential reappearance at any moment meant that the school's overall grade average was slipping. Nobody wanted to be the next Cedric Diggory.

Despite Minerva McGonagall's best efforts—extended office hours and group study sessions—the student body continued to slide. They were demotivated and McGonagall knew this. But what else could she do? She had begged the Headmaster to shut down the school for a time, perhaps until there was good news to report. But Dumbledore knew that if Hogwarts was closed now, its current pupils would probably be adults by the time it reopened. He couldn't do that to them, especially not to the ones who were almost set to graduate.

Meanwhile, the other houses were beginning to turn against the House of Negus. By now, everyone in the school had heard about the "free pass" that Ice Cube and Buggin' Out had been afforded if they stayed off the Quidditch team and so, with their own grades getting more and more abysmal with each passing test, they decided to take out their frustrations on the other house members as well. They were effectively giving Negus a collective silent treatment.

And it didn't stop with the students either. With the darkened mood came a lack of enthusiasm in the classroom, a consequence that the professors, whether subconsciously or not, began to blame on the Negus members' negative influence.

For instance, in Herbology class, Professor Sprout was delivering a lesson on Fanged Geranium, a subject that Mr. Jackson had taken great interest in, despite his own lack of ability to conjure up the magical flower. That said, whenever Sprout asked the class a question about the Geranium, Mr. Jackson's hand was the first to shoot up. Even though no other students seemed interested in volunteering an answer, the professor seemed to ignore Mr. Jackson's arm and would instead choose a different student. The third time this happened, Hermione Granger actually pointed this out but ended up getting fifty points deducted from their house. Mr. Jackson appreciated the effort nevertheless.

Speaking of Hermione, she too was beginning to experience a different kind of indifference than she was used to at Hogwarts. Where she was once made fun of for being too eager, or a keener, or a suck-up, or whatever name people came up with for being the smartest in the class, she was now struck with a slightly more personal attack. Her relationship with Cho, though initially discrete, seemed to spread like wildfire throughout the houses. Surely, theirs was not the first same-sex romance that Hogwarts had ever seen but, she had tried to reason to herself, they already hated her, and Cho hadn't exactly been nice to everyone all year, so perhaps that's what made them an easy target. It couldn't be personal, she thought. Hermione looked across at Mr. Jackson who was putting his hand back down and wondered if she would ever believe herself.

Predictably, the news of the romance reached the ears of Ronald Weasley almost immediately. Lost without the direction of their former leader, Crabbe and Goyle almost couldn't contain their delight as they squeezed their way up the staircase to Gryffindor Tower, blurting the news out as Ron exited through the Fat Lady painting.

At first, Ron didn't believe it. Ever since Draco had been expelled, Crabbe and Goyle had been looking for a fight with him and Harry but they couldn't quite muster the proper ammo to initiate one. Dismissively, Ron simply passed them on the staircase and made his way to the Great Hall.

The moment he entered, he caught a glimpse of the new couple holding hands and nearly threw up. He wanted to leave but he was glued to his spot. Like many of the other students that seemed to be staring at them, he couldn't tear his eyes away. The same feeling that was keeping him there was also the same feeling that was making him sick. It wasn't like he had anything against that kind of relationship—at least, he thought he didn't—but the sight of seeing Hermione with a smile on her face… a smile he hadn't seen since the start of their own relationship, made him realize just how badly he had screwed things up. He felt Harry's hand on his shoulder but pulled back and hurried out of the hall.

Harry felt badly for Ron. Not because of Hermione really, but because he hadn't spent as much time with his friend this year as he would have liked. He had started dream travelling again: an ability that Dumbledore was now helping him control. He had seen the Dark Lord for the first time since Cedric's death, but he hadn't yet told anyone about it. Normally, Ron and Hermione would be the first to know about experiences like this, but something was stopping him from getting them involved.

He had watched Cedric die right in front of him.

That could just have easily been Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Mr. Rogers, or any of his other friends at Hogwarts. Perhaps without realizing it, he had begun to distance himself from the other students. In a way, he was glad that Team Negus was taking a lot of the student body's attention away from him. He had to defeat Voldemort at all costs and didn't want there to be any more casualties. Even though he felt more and more alone, at least that meant the people he cared about would be safe.

In a darker part of the wizarding world, Lord Voldemort was pacing back and forth. Though he had successfully made his triumphant return, there was something about the world he had returned to that he didn't like. It wasn't that it was filled with Muggles, whose co-existence with wizards continued to disgust him, or that Harry Potter, the boy who disfigured and nearly killed him was still alive out there, it was that the world already seemed darker than how he had left it. Was it a feeling of individual isolation that he felt, as he apparated through towns, attempting to feed off the fear of unsuspecting victims? Or was it the feeling of surrendered acceptance? The lives he passed by seemed to have come to terms with a certain doom that felt forthcoming in their futures. Wizards and Muggles alike: there was something about the way they chose to accept the situation they were in, no matter how dark or depreciating, that truly disgusted him. Whatever higher being had broken this new generation had taken all of the fun out of his domination plans. As such, this was no longer the world that he wished to enslave. He stared into the dimension door before him and stepped through.

In sporting news, Cube and Buggin' Out were now MIA, but Quidditch season continued at Hogwarts. Though they started off with an early losing streak, once Team Negus began to grow (via more converts from the other houses), it quickly became a team favourite for the cup. Of course, Gryffindor still seemed poised to take the whole thing but, even though he could reliably deliver on the snitch-snatching front, their star seeker was starting to lose focus. Where Harry once found joy in flying his broomstick around the pitch, he now felt like he was simply going through the motions. Search, strike, catch, repeat. If he wasn't so damn good at his simple routine, Gryffindor's record surely would have tanked by now.

Other members of his team were having a more strenuous time keeping it together. One Ron Weasley in particular, hadn't been able to sleep since seeing Hermione and Cho together in the Great Hall. Though he had purposely avoided any interaction with Hermione, a feat that wasn't too difficult after she had migrated to Negus, a confrontation with Cho seemed inevitable thanks to an upcoming Quidditch match: Ravenclaw vs Gryffindor.

Ron was dreading the encounter.

By day, he had become a zombie—sludging along through the Hogwarts hallways, staring blankly while shifting staircases moved him at a much quicker pace than he was capable these days. He could hear people talking about him, especially Slytherin, but the insults had long since lost their weight, and ricocheted off of him like echoes in a winter storm.

Nighttime was even worse. Without the forced interaction of his peers and professors, he immediately disappeared into his room, pulling the blankets over his head until it was time to get up again. He sometimes felt guilty about shirking his revision responsibilities, and certainly knew Hermione would give him hell for it if she was still around, but he could no longer find the will to open a book outside of the classroom. It wasn't necessarily laziness or his long standing indifference to academia, he was just having a hard time feeling… motivated—for anything really. If it weren't for Harry, Ron probably would have dropped off of the Quidditch team a long time ago.

Ron could tell that something was wrong with his friend but couldn't bring himself to ask what. Instead, he offered silent companionship, a loyalty that he hoped would make up for the fact that they rarely spoke anymore, or went off on adventures together. In a way, he admired Harry for his ability to show such sadness for the passing of Cedric Diggory, especially since he had been dating a girl that Harry had loved since the very beginning. On the morning of the Ravenclaw Quidditch match, as Harry quietly explained to the huddled team members his familiar strategy, Ron wondered if he could ever feel such a remorse if he were in Harry's position. As the first whistle blew, the signal that it was time for the two teams to head out onto the pitch, Harry briefly turned back at Ron—where once there may have been a flicker, his eyes were now still. Was he trying to say something? Did he want Ron to say something? Could he sense that something terrible was brewing and was struggling to find the words to convince his best friend to let it go?

Ron looked away.

Elsewhere, Mr. Jackson was struggling to grow his Fanged Geranium. Though he was fortunate enough to be partnered with Hermione, who had fully sprouted hers within the first thirty seconds of this task, no matter what he did, his pot of soil refused to move. The wunderkind wizard could sense his frustration and was doing her best to patiently walk through, and repeat the steps with him.

Even though they weren't making a whole lot of progress, Hermione didn't mind; this was a fairly pleasant way to spend the afternoon. Sitting in the grass outside the Herbology greenhouse, they were both, at least for a little bit, free from the glares and judgment of their classmates and professors. In the distance, they could occasionally hear the faint roar of the Quidditch audience, no doubt reacting to some mad play or upset. Oddly enough, it wasn't even that distracting. In fact, hearing such distant enthusiasm was actually kind of soothing. Hermione lay on her back and stared at the great blue sky while Mr. Jackson dumped his pot out and started over.

Gryffindor was losing. Though Harry himself was on point as always, the speech he had made to the other players as team captain proved to not be rousing enough for them to care about the match. Ravenclaw, on the other hand, perhaps buoyed by Cho's energized hunger for the game, seemed to be on fire. Chaser Roger Davies in particular seemed especially motivated to crush Gryffindor's winning streak into the ground. He had managed to rack up eighty points alone before the end of the first period and showed no signs of slowing down.

And Ron Weasley wasn't exactly making things more difficult for him. The Gryffindor keeper kept fumbling the Quaffle, passing to the wrong players, finding himself in the way of Bludgers meant for Ravenclaw players—all because he was unable to tear his eyes away from the girl who had destroyed his soul: Cho Chang.

Following a brief break in the locker room, in which Harry attempted to reiterate his strategy to catch the snitch (a plan that wasn't all that different from the first time he explained it), Ron found himself hovering away from the Gryffindor goal posts, and towards the centre pitch. By the time the first whistle blew, his broom seemed to take on a mind of its own. At first, the other Gryffindor members didn't notice that Ron was no longer defending the hoops, but as he drew nearer to Ravenclaw territory, his intentions became clear.

Ron was no longer sure what force was driving him to do what he was about to do, but as he reached the end of the pitch where Cho hovered softly on her broomstick, he found himself unable to stop. Only seconds before, the Ravenclaw seeker had successfully grabbed the elusive snitch and was now admiring the winged walnut close-up. As this was the first time Cho had managed to catch the snitch all season, the moment was serving as a rare treat—she spun around to face her team, beaming with pride for her victory, and was surprised to find Ron Weasley, far outside the boundaries of his keeper zone, staring right at her. She looked back at him puzzled, unable to hear the desperate cries of Harry, who was still catching up behind her, bolting as fast as he could in their direction.

For the second time this year, Ron was unable to control the words that slipped out of his mouth. As he raised his wand into the air, Harry veered a hard right to avoid the spell and closed his eyes.

" _Crucio_."

An excruciating screech of pain scratched its way across the pitch. Heads began to turn in the direction of the outburst before the screech was repeated. An immediate silence fell over the audience, the other team players, and even announcer Lee Jordan, who had been excitedly recapping the game's highlights. The audience could only watch from their towers as the limp body of Cho Chang slipped off her broomstick, and began to fall.

On the grass outside the Herbology greenhouse, Mr. Jackson had finally started to make some progress—he reached out to high-five Hermione as the first buds of the Geranium began to peek through the soil.

"Oh, come on. Don't leave me hangin' here!" Mr. Jackson said, his high-five hand still hanging in position.

But Hermione was distracted—she stared out at the Quidditch pitch in the distance.

"Do you hear that?" she asked.

Mr. Jackson leaned back in the grass and strained his ears. "I don't hear anything."

Hermione continued to stare at the pitch. "Neither do I," she replied.


	12. Chapter 12

**The Return**

"What do you mean they're still gonna let him play?"

"This _has_ to be a joke."

"How the hell is he even still a student? Isn't what he did illegal? Don't people get sent to Azkaban for that shit?"

"It's beyond fucked, I know. But generations of that ginger shithead's last name have gone through Hogwarts and I have no doubt that plenty of strings were pulled to keep him right where he is." Dean Thomas was standing at the head of the Team Negus locker room, attempting to calm down his rapturously heated teammates—they had just received word through Luna's connections that Ron Weasley would be allowed to resume his role as keeper for Gryffindor. "The referee's turned a blind eye to that crazy ginger fuck and now Cho's in the hospital. And we all love our sister Hermione and feel for her but her sake, for Cho's sake, and for own own sake, we're not going to play dirty today. We're not going to get revenge. We've come too far to mess it all up over something that the proper authorities will handle in due time."

Mr. Jackson coughed something inaudible under his breath.

Dean continued, "Today is our day. The day does not belong to Run fucking Weasley. Today we're going to show them that we can get by just fine with ten dollar broomsticks. What we have that they don't have is heart. They have history behind them and something to lose, we have nothing to lose but something to prove. Today is the day we..." Dean trailed off as a familiar face appeared in the locker room's entrance.

"Barry?"

"Holy shit!"

Suddenly, the entire locked room erupted in cheers of joy as the team members embraced Barry Little who, for the first time since his accident, had decided to emerge from his bed in the hospital wing.

"Hey guys," he started, "Just thought you could use some extra support."

Mr. Jackson pushed the others out of the way and embraced Barry. The hospital was unable to repair the boy's right arm which meant his shoulder led out to just a stump—Mr. Jackson hugged him even tighter. Luna had stitched him together several custom sweaters which meant that he didn't actually have an empty right sleeve flopping around.

Hermione slowly approached Barry as Mr. Jackson broke away. She managed to ask the question that was on everybody's mind without opening her mouth.

"I think she's doing better…" Barry replied softly. "But she was asking for you."

Hermione dropped her head out of shame. "I wanted to see her, I just… I didn't know what to say."

"I hope you don't think what your ex-fucktard did was in any way your fault," snapped Mr. Jackson. "Not even remotely."

Dean Thomas raised his hand to regain control of the room. "Well, now we have another reason to win. Barry's never seen us lose and that's not about to start now."

"Technically, I've never seen you win either," Barry pointed out.

Dean thought about punching Barry in the shoulder, but refrained when he realized it was probably in poor taste. "Is everybody ready? I can hear them playing the Gryffindor anthem outside. Dobby?"

The house elf seeker's ears perked up. "Master Dean called Dobby?"

"You seem different today." Dean leaned in closely to inspect Dobby. "Your eyes seem… clearer."

"Dobby is clean as a whistle! Not a toke all month long!"

"Oh, well that's just great. I'm glad. You're a good team player, Dobby."

The house elf bowed his head in appreciation of the compliment.

"Alright, that's the whistle! Let's get out there and win!"

Team Negus exited the locker room and marched onto the field to rapturous applause. In stark contrast to their very first match, this time, the crowd was very much on their side. Though the red and gold colours were being flashed prominently and proudly in the stands, a clear wave of black rippled throughout the audience towers. Times sure had changed, Dean thought as he circled the pitch on his old broomstick. Maybe Team Negus really did have a chance at winning the cup.

While waving out to the audience as part of the pre-game warmup, he suddenly screeched to a halt in mid-air when he noticed a terrifying sight. He zoomed over to Team Negus' middle goal post where Dobby was inhaling from a black tube.

"What the fuck are you doing?!" Dean screamed as the house elf exhaled. "YOU AREN'T ALLOWED SMOKING! YOU'RE GOING TO GET US ALL DISQUALIFIED!"

"But Dobby isn't smoking anymore, Master Dean. Dobby is _vaping_."

"WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK, DOBBY!"

"See how clear Dobby's eyes are? That's because the vapor comes in very smooth. No one would know that Dobby is high because Dobby isn't very high."

"EVERYONE CAN SEE YOU DOING THIS! STOP THAT RIGHT NOW!" Dean was losing his voice from screaming so loudly. The referee blew the whistle to signal the team members to take their positions. "Oh Jesus, just get rid of that Dobby." He flew back towards the centre of the pitch to await the launch of the Quaffle.

"Dobby solemnly swears to not go above a [5]!" the house elf called after him.

"God fucking damnit, Jesus fuck face Christ," Dean cursed as he bolted across the pitch, only just making the tossing of the Quaffle in time. Scooping the ball right from under Angelina Johnson's unsuspecting nose, Dean easily carried the ball forward, dodging a tag team of bludgers from Fred and George Weasley and scored through the hoop with a simple underhand toss. "I hate everybody," he declared, finally starting to let off steam.

The rest of the match didn't go as smoothly as Dean's first goal. Though the house elves of Team Negus were in fine formation, they just couldn't seem to come together to rack up the score they needed. By the time the first hour passed, the score was 110-60 Gryffindor, and the golden snitch was still nowhere to be seen.

"Alright, that wasn't awful," Dean said to the team during their brief intermission in the locker room. "But if the snitch shows up, it's game over. And as much as I hate to admit it, nobody is faster than Harry's Firebolt. No offense, Dobby."

The house elf bowed. "Dobby cannot be offended."

"We need to come up with a new strategy. There has to be a way to close the point gap before the snitch appears."

Winky raised his hand. "We could do a Flying V?"

"Not now, Winky," Dean replied, waving his hand down. "If only we had… Cube!"

Standing in the locker room doorway, like a dark knight about to head into battle, Cube stood in his still-way-too-tight Team Negus uniform. "Miss me, suckas?"

"But how?" Dean asked. "I thought they wouldn't let you play with us unless you got your grades up."

Cube grinned. "I got my grades way up. Don't you worry about that." He noticed Barry sitting on a bench in the corner and walked over with his arm out stretched for a high-five. "Glad to see you out of bed, little man." Barry smiled and slapped his hand in return.

Suddenly, the whistle on the pitch blew again signalling the start of the next period. As Team Negus stepped back onto the grass, Mr. Jackson raised an eyebrow and whispered, "I don't buy your bullshit for one second. You want to tell me how you really got back here?"

"I cheated, nigga!"

"AND TEAM NEGUS IS ONCE AGAINST JOINED BY ICE CUBE!" Lee Jordan's booming voice was followed by an audience roar of approval. As Cube took to the skies and began to circle the pitch, he noticed that many of the audience members seemed to be throwing their hands up into the air with gang signs, a sight that was the polar opposite to the tepid reception he received the first time he circled the pitch. "Who in the fuck taught them that?" he wondered to himself.

"CAN TEAM NEGUS COME BACK BEFORE HARRY CATCHES THE SNITCH?"

"A bit bias don't you think? Fuck face!" Dean shouted at Lee as he defended the centre hoop (whacking the Quaffle into a flyball with the tail of his broomstick) from what would have been a breakaway goal by one of their senior chasers, Katie Bell.

Another period passed, and then another and still the snitch had yet to make its appearance. As Cube pummelled the ball through the tallest hoop, he squinted out at the sunset—they'd be losing light soon.

"LET'S HOPE THAT THE SNITCH SHOWS UP SOON OTHERWISE HALF OF TEAM NEGUS IS ABOUT TO GAIN A FIELD ADVANTAGE!"

Cube circled back to the announcer's booth. "Hey man, you _cannot_ be saying that shit. I'm serious, this is the last time I'm gonna let you…"

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Hermione make a bolt for the Gryffindor goal posts. Only seconds before, she had subbed in for Luna, who was showing some serious exhaustion—even more so than her regularly dreamy self. But Hermione didn't see an opening for a Quaffle pass. She didn't see a fellow teammate in harm's way of a bludger. And she certainly didn't see the golden snitch. All she saw was Ron Weasley: the Gryffindor goalkeeper who could see her coming for him the minute she was airborne, and yet was still frozen in place. What prevented him from moving was partially the fact that he didn't want to cost Gryffindor anymore points and it was also partially because he was embarrassed that everyone would see him running away from his ex-girlfriend. But the true reason he lacked the motion to move was because he knew he deserved this. As Hermione drew nearer, she reached into her sleeve and withdrew her wand.

Ron closed his eyes and thought about all the mistakes that had led him to this point in time. He loved her more than anything—but why did he do it? At the time it felt like he was pushed into making that decision. Was it really him who did that to Cho? How could he possibly create such a reason that would lead him to such a disgusting act? In his head, he recalled the boy who pointed that wand at Cho, wanting her to feel terrible things. This boy didn't look like Ron, he didn't act like Ron, and he certainly didn't seem to think like Ron… and yet, there was nobody else to blame.

"Open your eyes," Hermione instructed, now hovering a couple feet away from Ron. "I want you to listen to me." The Quidditch match seemed to temporarily pause as the other team members held in place, waiting to see what Hermione was about to do. The audience was holding its breath. "A long time ago I used to imagine us growing old together. I used to imagine us having kids together." She paused and looked down at the grass, dozens and dozens of feet below them. "And when I think of what you did to Cho, there's a part of me that wishes I had it in me to do the exact same thing to you." She looked at him directly. "But I can't. The worst thing I could ever do to you is something you've already done yourself. You've killed our future. We're not going to be lovers. We're not going to be friends. We're not going to be anything at all. If I hit you right now, you'd remember it. If I cursed a spell on you right now, you'd damn well remember it. But I don't want you to have anymore memories of me, Ron. That's your punishment from me."

Hermione began to lower herself, descending to the earth with her broom until she was close enough to the ground that she could hop off. Without bending over to scoop up her fallen broom, she walked off the pitch in the direction of the hospital wing.

Still floating in the silence that had overtaken the pitch, Ron's eyes were now glued to the broomstick that Hermione had left behind and how its bristles twinkled in the golden hour grass.

Before Lee Jordan could grab his microphone, before Dean Thomas could motion to Dobby, and even before Harry Potter could get his headstart, Barry Little stood up in the stands and pointed at the fleeting glimmer of light. He cried out, "It's the snitch!"

The crowd went mad as Harry bolted towards it.

On the other side of the pitch, Dobby was having a bit of trouble finding his sense of direction. He circled around the Team Negus goal posts as the audience screamed at him to fly to the other side of the field.

"Goddamn that house elf," muttered Dean as he sped off towards Dobby. "Stall him!" he yelled out as he sped past Mr. Jackson.

Mr. Jackson looked at Cube who nodded his understanding. The pair took off towards Harry, each of them managing to catch a bludger that was thrown at them by both Fred and George Weasley. The snitch, now mere inches from Harry's fingertips decided to make a hard right turn at the Gryffindor goal posts giving them the opportunity they needed. With Harry now moving back in their direction, Cube wound up his arm and dunked. But Harry saw it coming. He ducked out of the way, snapping his tail to bounce the bludger back.

"Shit!" Cube exclaimed as the bludger hit him square in the chest, half knocking him off his broomstick. "Get him, Jackson!"

Mr. Jackson decided to take a safer approach, flying behind Harry as quickly as his riggity broomstick would allow, waiting for the moment that the seeker would reach the end of the pitch and be forced to circle around. But just as that moment came, and Mr. Jackson raised his arm, he felt the full force of two bludgers beat into his back, causing him to lose his grip on the one in his hand. Behind him, he heard Fred and George Weasley celebrate.

It's too late, Mr. Jackson thought to himself as the distance between him and Harry now widened so much that it was pointless to chase after him. He turned around to help Cube, who was just managing to hang on, back onto his broomstick.

When Cube saw Mr. Jackson heading in his direction, he tried to wave him away. "Go after them! I'll be fine!"

"We'll never catch him on these things," Mr. Jackson replied. "There's just no comparison. It's just a matter of time now before..."

Winky and the other house elves had finally achieved their perfect formation and were heading at full force towards the end of the pitch. Mr. Jackson extended his hand and pulled Cube back on. The pair joined the house elves and together they zoomed towards the goal post.

"I DON'T BELIEVE IT!" Lee Jordan exclaimed with his jaw dropped. "ARE THEY DOING A… FLYING V?"

Meanwhile, Dean Thomas, who had completely given up on Dobby understanding even the simplest of directions, had swept him clean off his broomstick and now sped towards the snitch with the house elf under his arm.

Harry had been so focused on the ever elusive snitch that he hadn't yet seen the strange formation that was now walloping towards him. "What the fuck?" he exclaimed, just as Dean Thomas hoisted Dobby above his head and threw him toward the snitch with all his might. As Dobby soared through the air, each of the house elves in the Flying V formed a straight line and batted the tails of their broomsticks upward, whacking the poor house elf to move faster through the air, giving him the momentum he needed to win the game.

Mr. Jackson suddenly realized that Dobby was going to crash without his broomstick. "Cube!" he shouted. "Get to the hoop!"

Cube cut diagonally across the pitch to the centre Gryffindor goal post. The snitch, Harry, and now Dobby were all barreling towards it. Harry felt something pulling on the tail of his broomstick. He looked over his shoulder to see that the house elf had successfully managed to latch himself aboard.

"You're not supposed to do that! This has to be illegal!" Harry cried as Dobby hoisted himself on the broom and proceeded to climb up his body. Now, sitting atop Harry's head with the snitch a mere seconds away from being snatched, Dobby closed his eyes and leapt forward. He felt his tiny fingers close around the golden wings just as Cube turned in to catch him.

"Hey, watch out!" Harry reared his broomstick and pivoted upwards, shouting in pain as his knee banged across the top of the hoop.

Misinterpreting Harry's warning as a reference to the tight squeeze through the goal post, Cube continued forward holding Dobby, not realizing that a dimension door had been opened before him—until he had flown straight through it.


	13. Chapter 13

**Lost and Found**

When Cube opened his eyes again, the world had changed. Before he had passed through what seemed to be a dimension door, the sun had been setting far west of the Gryffindor goal hoops, and darkness had already started to pass over the pitch. But now, in this world beyond the world that he knew, the sun was shining high in the sky and the overcast cloud of England had been removed and replaced with a solid palette of blue.

"Dobby thinks we aren't in Kansas anymore," the house elf said as Cube slowed his broom to a halt. They were overlooking the thick canopy of a rainforest that seemed to stretch out as far as they both could tell.

Cube looked over his shoulder. The dimension door hadn't yet closed, (thank God, he thought), but before he could turn the broom around, he heard a familiar shout below.

"HELP! ANYBODY HELP!"

Sensing what Cube was about to do, Dobby gripped his arm and shook his head. "Dobby thinks that was just the wind."

"HELPPPP!" the voice called out again.

"C'mon man, we aren't just going to ignore that." Cube began a descent into the rainforest as Dobby climbed up onto his shoulders. As the pair drifted downwards, they became overwhelmed by the humidity radiating off the jungle floor. They were careful not to disturb many branches as they dropped through the trees—they were well aware of the families of bewildered monkeys who were watching their every move toward the jungle floor.

Finally, Cube could make out the the scruffy black hair of a boy running through the forest. "Oh shit!" Cube exclaimed as he sped up the descent, pivoting so fast that Dobby was nearly rocked off of his shoulders.

"HELLPP… Ice Cube, is that you?" Neville Longbottom stopped in his tracks and squinted above him. The long lost member of Gryffindor certainly looked a whole lot different than the last time any wizard had set sights on him. His robes were mostly torn now—so much so that he had been forced to repurpose them, turning them into a Tarzan-like attire that matched the mud and dirt that was spread all over his body.

"I thought I was losing my mind!" Cube exclaimed excitedly. "Goddamn, just wait until they get a load of you. And to think they refused to believe me…"

Cube trailed off as he suddenly realized why Neville was called for help. The trees in the distance seemed to be parting, as if making way for some great being that was tearing through the jungle towards them.

Neville caught his breath and looked over his shoulder. "We can lose it if we stay low."

"Fuck that shit," said Cube. "I've got a broomstick and I'm outta here." Dobby saluted Neville from atop Cube's head as the pair restarted its ascent out of the jungle.

"Wait! You can't just leave me here!" Neville protested as a massive one hundred foot burgundy dinosaur burst through the trees, lunging its teeth at Neville as he scrambled into the forest's underbrush.

"Stay alive, nigga!" Cube called back. "I'm getting help!" Cube and Dobby lifted off towards the canopy just as the Paozusaurus noticed the rising broomstick.

"Dobby, thinks we're in trouble!" the house elf cried out as the enlarged reptile began climbing up the trees.

"We'll make it." Cube tilted the head of the broom until it was almost completely vertical, so much that Dobby was forced to hang on to Cube by his collar to prevent himself from falling off completely. Finally, the sunlight shining through the cracks of the canopy signalled the fact that they were getting closer. Squinting past the tree-tops, Cube could still just make out the shimmering dimension door—a purple oval whose edges appeared to be contracting.

Cube pushed harder. Though he refused to look down at the creature that seemed to be rapidly scaling the trunks towards him, he could hear its claws sink into the wood, and the snapping of branches as it hopped from tree to tree. Could he feel it breathing on his neck? No, that was just Dobby. He suddenly had an idea.

"Dobby! The snitch! Do you still have it?"

"You can call Dobby the mailman because he always delivers." The house elf opened his clenched palm and the golden walnut with wings, once again jolted back to life. As the broom continued its ascension, it fluttered off towards the earth, catching the attention of the predator that was previously closely on their tail.

"Is that thing still following us?"

"Dobby thinks the creature is going to score 150 points."

They tore through the canopy and were forced to shield their eyes from the unexpected power of the blinding sunlight. "If Dobby survives this, he is hitting a [10] when he gets back home."

"Yeah, you and me both."

The pair drifted towards the dimension door that had since been reduced to half of its original size; it was now very clearly closing—and fast. Not wanting to miss it or hit the sides as they crossed through, Cube had slowed the broomstick down so that they were inching towards safety.

"We are almost home free," complained Dobby. "Why aren't we going faster?"

"The entrance isn't as big as it was before. If we miss this, we're both fucked."

Just as the duo reached the door, the canopy leaves below them were shred apart as the Paozusaurus leapt at them; with its claws outstretched, Cube was almost certain it would leave a mark.

"Where did they go?" The Hogwarts staff, including Filius Flitwick, Aurora Sinistra, Sybill Trelawney, Snape, and McGonagall were circling the dimension door from the other side, patrolling the perimeter to ensure that there were no other casualties. McGonagall was first to join the scene and was doing her best to keep the curious Quidditch members from getting too close.

"I tried to warn them!" cried Harry Potter. The boy who lived wiped a pool of sweat off his forehead. First Cedric, and now this? Dobby was one of Harry's earliest friends at Hogwarts; he wouldn't know what to do if he was gone forever.

"I tried to warn them too," said Trelawney, whose psychedelic state of mind had many wondering how she was able to properly fly a broomstick.

"We know you did, Mr. Potter," McGonagall wished she could spend more time consoling the boy but was forced to focus her concern on the dimension door before them. Dumbledore had informed the staff that there had been an incident involving one of these, but she had never seen one for herself. Did Mr. Koreander cause this? She recalled the fact that the professor had been prohibited from generating another such door on school grounds. But then, she pondered, where did it come from? And where did it lead?

Before she could find the answers to her questions, Ice Cube and Dobby triumphantly shot through the door, startling the party of wizards that were gathering around it.

"Get back, niggas!" Cube shouted as two claws reached through the door, wrapping its nails around the edges as the creature tried to pull itself through.

Snape sneered. "So today is going to be one of those days, right Minerva?" He withdrew his wand, and readied himself for the pending confrontation.

"What _is_ that thing?!" McGonagall shouted as the other professors scattered across the pitch. Mr. Jackson, who had been glued to the door's side since Cube disappeared through it, flew over to check on his brother.

"Are you alright, nigga?" Mr. Jackson glanced worriedly at the cuts across Cube's face—a leftover result from crashing his broom through the rainforest canopy.

Cube looked over his shoulder at the emerging dinosaur, whose scale-covered head was beginning to peek through the dimension door. "For now," he replied. "But we have to figure out how to close that door."

"Did Koreander do that?"

Cube shook his head. "I have a feeling it wasn't him."

The house elf on Cube's shoulder pointed down at the ground, near to the entrance of the pitch, where an older wizard was hurrying across the field while trying not to trip over his robes. "Don't worry, former slave master Dumbledore will save us," Dobby insisted.

From below, Dumbledore twirled his wand in a motion familiar to the students who were present the last time he was forced to close a dimension door. " _Confectrix!_ " he yelled out as a white beam bolted out the tip of his wand, lighting up the night swollen pitch as it shot across it, and travelled towards the dimension door like a bullet train in the dark. McGonagall and Harry dodged out of the way as the beam hit the door, instantly increasing its shrinking speed.

Dumbledore clapped his hands together in a tiny motion of accomplishment. "Now that that's taken care of, I'd like to know what's…"

Though the door was indeed nothing more than a tiny purple circle in the sky, it had yet to close fully. The pair of claws that gripped the edges refused to let go. Dumbledore's mouth widened as he began to witness the impossible. The relentless dinosaur was stretching his arms out, and in turn, reopening the door so it was large enough for it to fit through.

"I'll fetch Koreander!" Dumbledore called out as he ran back across the pitch.

"Professor!" McGonagall called back just as the Paozusaurus finally managed to pull the door open wide enough that it was able to leap through.

The dinosaur fell the entire forty feet to the darkened earth and hit the ground with a rumble. Without required instruction, the word _Lumos_ began to echo out across the pitch. The Hogwarts staff was determined to keep a series of spotlights on the Paozusaurus until they could figure out how to deal with it.

Professor McGonagall turned to Harry: "Got any bright ideas, Potter?"

A light went off in Harry's head. "Actually, I do," he replied, thinking back to last year's Triwizard Tournament. During the first task, the champions were meant to retrieve a golden egg that was being guarded by a dragon. Though Harry had chosen a slightly more out of the box approach to getting the egg (by way of summoning his broomstick), he learned afterwards that a much more effective way would have been to shoot the dragon in its weakest points—the eyes.

Harry leaned in on his Firebolt, initiating a clean descent toward the dinosaur. Though the Quidditch pitch was more or less completely darkened by nightfall, save for the light beams from the other wizards' wands, he had a fairly good lock on the creature that was stomping away from him—with a slight limp that seemed to have been inflicted by the fall—and was more than ready to put an end to its rampage.

Harry managed to circle around the creature and raised his wand. As the resulting sparks from the Conjunctivitis Curse left the tip of Harry's wand, he could just make out the students that remained in the tower stands, glued to their seats as they watched the unfolding confrontation in the background, rather than evacuate as McGonagall had instructed. Harry instantly realized the severity of his mistake.

The sparks hit the Paozusaurus square in the eyes causing it to yelp and leap back in pain as the fire burned through its skull. The dinosaur spun around madly, unable to cope with its new blindness.

Mr. Jackson was watching the creature from above and put two and two together. "Barry!" he called out as he sped towards the stands. Barry Little, who was just as entranced at the dinosaur situation as the other students, didn't have much time to react as the Paozusaurus continued to stumble backwards, ultimately smashing into the base of the audience tower. Mr. Jackson swooped in and grabbed Barry by the scruff of his collar just as the tower began to collapse.

The other circling professors, formerly preoccupied with keeping the dinosaur alit, now began to shout incantations at the tower to prevent it from crumbling further. But it was too little too late, the tower was coming down and it was breaking apart into too many pieces for it to be successfully saved. Barry looked back at the students left behind as they succumbed to their tower burial.

"Jesus," Harry whispered as he could only watch as the tower crashed across the pitch.

The Hogwarts staff immediately changed direction and bolted toward the tower ruins, with the hopes of pulling out any survivors from the wreckage.

Barry, who was still being dragged through the air by Mr. Jackson with one hand, pulled at his sleeve. "Fly over its head." He pointed at the dinosaur that was no longer spinning about in the dark, but instead was seated firmly in the grass, crying out into the night as it rubbed furiously as its eyes.

"What? Oh hell no. Hell. Fucking. No."

"I can do this."

Mr. Jackson took a deep breath as he veered around, changing course towards the dinosaur. "I'm staying up here though."

"That's fine," Barry replied as he withdrew his wand. " _Acidio!_ " he shouted as a stream of yellow liquid poured out of his wand, landing on the centre of the Paozusaurus' skull. The dinosaur didn't have a chance to scream at the burning sensation because the acid had already eaten through his entire head before Mr. Jackson and Barry touched down in front of it.

"Goddamn," said Mr. Jackson as the now headless dinosaur slumped over, hitting the earth with a thud. "So that's what they teach you in the hospital?"

Barry approached the creature slowly while the acid spell continued to work its way across the rest of its body. In just a matter of seconds, its flesh had completely disintegrated, leaving a massive skeleton behind.

"Don't get too close!" Mr. Jackson called after him (even though he was curious to inspect the diseased creature himself).

Ice Cube landed behind Mr. Jackson, allowing Dobby to finally disembark. "This is just fucked up."

Barry stepped under the skeletal frame of the beast's stomach and scooped something off of the ground.

"Hey, get out of there," yelled Mr. Jackson. "How do you even know your spell's worn off already?"

Barry stepped out of the stomach holding an orange sphere in his hand. He held it up as Mr. Jackson, Cube and Dobby all took turns holding it. The glass-like object sported four red stars and reflected back their faces as they looked over it one by one.

Ice Cube tossed the sphere back to Barry. "Call me crazy," he started, "But is that a goddamn Dragon Ball?"

 **END OF ACT I**


	14. Chapter 14

**The President**

"We have a package for you, sir."

"But I didn't order anything, Joe."

"That's what I told the delivery man. But he wouldn't take no for an answer. Should I tell the Secret Service to destroy it?"

The President of the United States stared at the long thin crate that his VP had just dragged into the oval office.

"That won't be necessary," Obama replied. "If I can't open my own unmarked packages then the terrorists have already won."

Outside of Hogwarts, and outside of England, in a country far, far away, the most important people in the world were watching the news. The Dark Lord's return was just a blip on the local news stations but even so, Obama knew he'd be expecting a phone call from the British government at any moment. He mused about the situation: _those people never could take care of anything themselves_. _They were always calling him for back up_. "It's only the Enslaver of Humanity," he had initially replied to them via email. "Nuke him off the face of the planet if he's uncooperative."

Joe Biden had begun to take the duct tape off the mysterious package as Obama watched from behind his desk. _Wizards_ , he thought to himself. _Goddamn wizards_. During his time as a Senator, he had heard rumours of this community, a group of people who could do things that regular people could not. A group of people who lived with special privileges, received special education and benefits, and who were ultimately rewarded with better paying jobs than those that were deemed to be "non-magical". Obama winced; he did not like wizards.

"Do you need a hand with that… or a crowbar?" Obama asked as Joe attempted to rip the lid off the crate with his bare hands.

Joe spit in his palms and slapped them together. "Nope," he replied. "Just an extra bit of elbow grease and I've almost… got it!" The lid popped off and Joe put his hands on his hips. "Well, I'll be."

Obama stepped over to inspect the package himself. He shook his head when he saw what was inside.

"An empty portrait?" Joe asked, bewildered. "Now who in the world would ship you an empty portrait?"

But Obama had done his homework and he was ready for this day. "It's not empty," he started. "It seems to be a gift from… across the pond."

"I don't understand," said Joe as he pulled the portrait out of the crate and held it up. The painting itself wasn't exactly empty—though there was no subject in the frame, there appeared to be a cloud of smoke that, if Joe didn't know any better, seemed to be shifting slightly before his eyes.

Obama leaned forward and tapped on the canvas. "Knock knock. Is anyone home?" As the painted smoke parted, and Snoop Dogg emerged with a half used blunt, Joe gasped in shock, nearly dropping the painting in the process.

The Vice President wasn't sure what to be more shocked by—the fact that there was someone moving around in the painting, or the fact that his colleague didn't appear to be startled by this.

"I'd offer you a puff," said Snoop, noticing Joe's clear consternation, "But I'm a painting."

Obama couldn't look less impressed. "I hope you don't mind me asking. But did that Dumbledore character send you here?"

Snoop inhaled and shook his head. "I don't think Uncle even knows I got myself turned into a painting by that Death Eater chick."

"One of them turned you into a painting?"

"It's a long story, nephew."

Still propping up the painting in utter disbelief, Joe stared at Snoop with his jaw dropped.

"Do you mind giving us a minute?" Obama asked upon realizing that Joe wasn't going to be much use in the forthcoming conversation. "Just rest it against my desk."

Joe did as he was told, hedging the painting up against the centre desk (while Snoop eyed him through the painted haze) and slowly backed out of the office.

"You'll have to excuse my partner," Obama explained. "He hasn't yet been introduced to your magical brand of politics." He waited until the office door had clicked shut before continuing. "So why are you here if Albus didn't send you? I know he's going to need my help taking down that lizard faced crackhead."

"This isn't about you know who," Snoop replied, lowering his voice.

"Then what? Why are you in my office?"

Obama didn't realize it, but he had begun pacing in front of the giant portrait.

Snoop took one final long drag before putting his arm down. "I'm here because my brothers are in trouble."

Snoop spent the next half hour explaining to the President what Bellatrix had told him before cursing him to an eternity behind softened hues. When Snoop had finished, Obama dug into his breast pocket and withdrew a joint he had rolled earlier that morning. He took a moment to think to himself in silence before lighting up.

"I want to believe what you're telling me," he started, "But even if I did, I have a country to run. And I can't just drop everything because some painting tells me so."

He looked nervously at his watch. He had a press conference about the California water supply situation in five minutes. There were rumours going around that giants had been draining the lakes.

"You can do nothing," said Snoop. "But is it really worth the risk? Do you really want Sasha and Malia to grow up in a world… that you were responsible for?"

Obama let out an exasperated sigh of defeat but snapped his fingers. He hurried over to the entrance to his office, swung the door open, and poked his head out into the hallway.

"Michelle!" he called out. "Pack your bags and grab the kids! It looks like we're bringing freedom to Hogwarts!"


	15. Chapter 15

**The Part Time Job**

No matter what Harry Potter did, he couldn't seem to get the ice cream blender working.

"Do I have to explain it again for you?" His manager, a teenage girl with a lip ring and black lipstick, hovered behind him while she walked him through the steps of a regular day on the job. Today was Harry's first day working at Dairy Queen. At Dumbledore's insistence, all of the Hogwarts students were sent back home for the winter holidays (due to the incident on the Quidditch pitch—a memory that Harry was still unable to shake) which meant he was back with the Dursleys for the next couple weeks. Rather than being allowed to watch the family watch Christmas television specials, Aunt Petunia thought it might be more becoming to have Harry substitute in for Dudley's part-time job so their little popkin could stay at home and spend more time with the family. Though he didn't get to keep the paycheque, Harry couldn't complain. The less time he had to spend with that family, the better.

"So like, he is your brother or something?" Delilah the manager asked Harry, who had just unplugged and then plugged back in the blender.

"He's more of a cousin," Harry replied. "We only see each other when we need to."

"Sounds like my family." Delilah put her hand on the blender, preventing him from trying anything else to getting it started. "Look kid, maybe working behind the counter isn't for you." She noticed Harry's defeated expression. "Don't be so hard on yourself. Not everyone has the right knack for making ice cream." She put her hand on his shoulder and rotated him so that the costume in the corner of the store was in his direct line of sight. "Here's a thought… have you ever worked in advertising?"

I can't believe this, Harry thought to himself while twirling the giant "HOT EATS, COOL TREATS" sign outside the storefront. To further his humiliation, Delilah had made him put on the giant costume—his body was now a large cup while a cutout of ice cream rested on his shoulders. Harry was so distraught by his inability to lure passing drivers into their parking lot (and also distracted by the slurs that they made at him as they whipped by) that he didn't even notice the newly restored flying Ford Anglia hover in behind him, landing perfectly in the handicapped parking space.

Delilah came running out of the store in disbelief. With her jaw dropped, she whispered, "You… you…"

The door of the Anglia swung open and Fred and George popped out of the front.

"We what?" Fred asked.

"You can't park there…"

"Oh, right. Hagrid, hurry up and get out of there so we can shrink this thing."

Hagrid squeezed his way out of the backseat and groaned as his limbs struggled to get out. "I'm coming, I'm coming. Don't lose your head." The half giant groaned as he stretched to his feet. Although wizard magic allowed them to make the car's backseat much bigger on the inside than it was on the outside, it was still a considerable effort to push through the entrance of the car.

"Hey, boy who lived!" George called out just as Fred snapped his fingers, shrinking the car to the size of a keychain. Harry spun around and immediately dropped his sign. He walked over to his friends with his head down, ashamed that they were seeing him like this.

Unsure of the person walking toward them, Hagrid reached into his breast pocket and put on his reading glasses. His eyes widened when he realized that it really was his best friend in the giant ice cream costume. "Yer a blizzard, Harry," Hagrid exclaimed.

"You don't need to rub it in, Hagrid. The Dursleys are making me do this."

"Well, that's a new low even for them. But never you mind, we're here to take you back to Hogwarts. It looks like there's been a development… hey you two, come back!"

Fred and George had wandered into the ice cream parlour and appeared to be helping themselves to free samples—via the summoning charm.

Delilah watched with wonder as the small scoops of ice cream floated by her.

Hagrid rushed into the Dairy Queen waving his arms. He whacked the Weasley brothers' wands down to break the charm. "Nothing to see here, ma'am."

"How did you do that?" she asked.

"I think they must be using mirrors or somethin'."

He pulled the Weasleys to the side. "Ixnay on the magic business. We _are_ still in Muggle land after all."

Harry, who had already begun stepping out of the ice cream mascot costume, hopped over to Hagrid—his leg was caught in the abnormally large Oreo feet. "So what's this about a new development?" he asked. "Even though Dumbledore said it was just for the winter break, I would've thought the school would have been closed down for _at least_ the rest of the year."

Hagrid was helping Delilah pick up the mini-cup sized samples of ice cream from off the floor. "I thought so too. But it turns out the Headmaster has other plans."

"He wants to what?" Cube asked as Hermione broke the news to the rest of the House of Negus. Though the other houses had been sent back home for the holidays, the Negus family was unable to afford such a luxury—what with living on the other side of the world and all—and instead opted to spend the season in their dark and dank quarters. Hermione had initially gone back home to stay with her Muggle family, but here she was again, standing before Cube, Mr. Jackson, Barry and the rest, as she attempted to explain what Hagrid had told her over owl post.

"Dumbledore wants to go through the dimension door. Now that he knows you can come back," she looked pointedly at Cube, "He believes the wizarding world has a shot at making its own, separate community."

Mr. Jackson was half-heartedly poking at the fireplace but stood up when he heard these words. "Hold up. Don't wizard folk already have their own thing? Is that not enough?"

Hermione shook her head. "Though I don't agree, I can see where he's coming from. We have our own castles and our own land and our own stores, but we take great efforts to remain hidden. I suppose if we lived in our own universe we wouldn't have to feel like we…"

"Couldn't be out in public," Cho finished for her. Much to everyone's relief, especially Hermione's, the Ravenclaw Seeker had made a full recovery. In the end, she hadn't required much additional surgery since her last Quidditch game, but there was something noticeably different about her. She spoke much more slowly than before, almost as if she being careful, and didn't seem to react as quickly as she used to. Immediately following her dismissal from the hospital wing, she cocooned up in Hermione's bed, only ever leaving to go to the bathroom. In fact, her joining the rest of Negus in the common room right now, was an extremely rare occurrence. Once over the break, Dean had attempted to coax her out for Quidditch practice but she made it clear that she had no further intention of ever picking up a broomstick again.

Hermione wrapped her arm around Cho in appreciation for stepping out from under the covers. "Anyways, that's what Dumbledore wants. But it's not what everyone wants." She explained that much of the Hogwarts staff, led by an appeal from Professor McGonagall, felt like it might be in everybody's best interest to close off the dimension door completely. Interestingly enough, the Ministry of Magic had stepped out to agree with her. The aging magical government didn't normally intervene in educational related affairs, but when they received wind that "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" had possibly taken the plunge into the aforementioned next dimension, they decided to seize on the opportunity to shut him out of their world for good.

The problem was that nobody had ever permanently closed a dimension door before—or even knew if such an act carried with it any repercussions. Professor Koreander theorized that "to kill a dimension door was to kill the dimension itself", meaning that if one could find a way to shut down a door for good, they would not only kill every living thing living behind the door, but wipe their memory from sheer existence.

Dumbledore was unwilling to take that chance. To stall for time, he had organized a task force whose job was to travel to the other world and report back their findings. They didn't even know for sure whether Voldemort had in fact left the wizarding world, and they at least owed it to the beings living beyond to exact a confirmation.

As Death Eater activity was relatively quiet these days, an observation attributed to the supposed disappearance of their leader, it was decided that several members of the Order of the Phoenix could temporarily be relieved of their regular duties to embark on this journey.

Cube waved his arms, interrupting Hermione. "You know this whole taskforce is complete bullshit. The only reason the Ministry agreed to go along with it is so they can blame the whole thing on a third party in case anything goes wrong. They don't care if they come back with any 'results'. If they have a way to kill Voldemort without even breaking a sweat, you can bet your ass that they're gonna take it."

Mr. Jackson was staring at the fireplace, arms crossed. "What do you care if they close the door forever? You almost got yourself and the rest of us killed when you went through there."

"I _care_ because Longbottom is still in there. And I told him I'd be back for him."

"Man, how many times are you gonna bring up that Longbottom? That boy isn't real and now I'm starting to think you fabricated him to get attention.

"Fuck you, Jackson."

"Boys listen!" Hermione raised her voice to cut the tension between them. "Regardless of whether or not this Neville character exists is irrelevant. That dinosaur followed Cube through the door so we know that life existing there is a _fact_. And I'm with Dumbledore on this one—it's not a fact we can ignore."

Buggin' Out, who up to this point had been sitting quietly in the corner of the room, staring at a blank video game screen, finally spoke up, "If Snoop was here, he'd know what to do."

The room let a collective moment of silence pass to pay respects for their fallen friend.

"Getting trapped in a painting," Buggin' Out continued, "That's some Yu-Gi-Oh shit right there."

"Getting trapped in a painting is the highest honour a wizard who has passed on can receive." Startled, the room jumped at the sudden entrance of Professor McGonagall, who seemed to have been standing in the Negus doorway for an undetermined amount of time. "I couldn't help but overhear your disapproval of the government's plan. It's disappointing that you would be so willing to indirectly aid a murderer by not supporting what is clearly the right decision." Her eyes scanned the room, sizing up the individual members of the House of Negus; they stopped on Hermione. "I'm especially disappointed in you, Miss Granger. You could have found yourself ascending to such heights if you had only followed through with Gryffindor. It isn't too late you know if you ever decide…" McGonagall glanced sharply at Cho—her expression turned to disgust when she noticed she was holding Hermione's hand. "... to come back to reality," she finished.

With that, the professor turned around and exited the House of Negus without waiting for a reply.

"Jesus, what the fuck was that?" Cube exclaimed, rushing over to the common room entrance to check if anyone else was listening in on the conversation.

Much to everyone's surprise, Cho replied, "That cunt couldn't give two shits whether or not we support them. They came here for information. Maybe they think you know something they don't?"

Cube looked taken aback. "What the hell would I know that they don't?"

"Let me see. They're looking for the Dark Lord. You're the only one who might have seen him. I wonder what they might possibly want to know."

"They think that _I_ saw Voldemort? I was only in there for two minutes!"

"The Ministry doesn't take any chances. Be careful is all I'm saying."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Buggin' Out interrupted. "You think... that they think... that Cube is somehow involved with that asshole?"

Cho let go of Hermione's hand. "I don't think they actually believe that. But it wouldn't stop them from going with it if they had to. They still don't know where that dimension door on the Quidditch pitch came from and you _were_ closest, after all."

Without realizing it himself, Cube had begun to pace the common room. "Now _you're_ talking like you know something that we don't." He finally put two and two together. "Christ, doesn't your mother work for the Ministry of Magic?"

Without making eye contact with him, Cho bowed her head.

"She doesn't know anything for sure," Hermione replied, realizing that Cho wasn't going to reply again out loud, "It's only talk at this point."

"Wait a second, you knew about this too? Jesus."

Hermione hung her head in shame. "I just… I didn't want to worry you with something that wasn't one hundred percent."

Mr. Jackson stepped forward. "That brings me to something that's been on my mind for a while now. Koreander said that different people could go to different places when they travel through a dimension door?"

"Right..." Cube replied, slowly realizing where this was going.

"So how exactly do they intend to send a task force into the world you just left… unless they're following you through the door?"

Hermione, who was biting her lip as she attempted to think her way through their current situation, asked, "But then wouldn't that also mean that Voldemort could be in a completely different universe than the world they're travelling to?"

"Voldemort could be in a completely different universe from the world they intend to _destroy_ ," Mr. Jackson corrected.

The room fell silent.

"They don't care if Voldemort is in the world they destroy," Hermione said finally, putting the last puzzle piece in place. "They only want to make it look like he was."

"Which means they'll probably use me to travel through the door," said Cube. He turned to face the others. "We need prove to them that they're making a huge mistake if they shut down the dimension door. The only way to save that world is to prove that other people… people they know are living in it." He hesitated, knowing full well that he was walking towards a path of danger. A frightening future lay ahead of him, but he was no longer able to turn his back on it. "We need to bring back Neville Longbottom."

Mr. Jackson had lit a pipe and was now breathing into it slowly. "One thing's for sure, unless you want the wizarding world to think you're in cahoots with the Dark Lord, your black ass better not even _utter_ the word Voldemort until this whole thing blows over."


	16. Chapter 16

**A Date with the Dark Lord**

By Rita Skeeter

 _The man known as Ice Cube looks up at me with swollen eyes. How long has he been crying? Hours, perhaps. The tears running down his cheeks tell a tale of which I can only speculate. He has called for this interview, not I. He reached out to me when rumours of his involvement with He-Who-Must-Not-_

 _Be-Named came to light. And now here we are—sitting in a quaint coffee shop in Hogsmeade, while he struggles to speak. His hands tremble around his mug of hot tea while his words seem to quiver on the precipice of his lips. Perhaps he sees me as his Pastor and he is awaiting my blessing to confess his sins. I pat his arm and remind him of the greater good. No matter what crimes he has committed, the Daily Prophet will see to it that the truth will be seen by all. And in this truth, I tell him, he will find his redemption._

 _He nods at me slowly and begins to talk—so quickly that my hovering quill can barely keep up. He tells a story of how Death Eaters arrived at his home in a suburban black neighbourhood, and threatened his family unless he agreed to work for the Dark Lord. For years, he has served as the Dark Lord's right hand man—and in such secrecy, that even the oldest Death Eaters were unaware of Cube's involvement. Cube stops in mid-speech and reaches across the table for a tissue. As he blows his nose, I can tell that something enormous is coming, something that he has waited to lift off his chest for a very long time._

 _His tears are raining harder down his face now as he welcomes this opportunity, and decides to seize it. He tells me of the Dark Lord's plan to kidnap wizards and bring them over, en masse, to the next dimension. He paints me a picture of their plans and it immediately becomes difficult for me to keep down my breakfast._

 _He tells me a horror story of a world of enslavement, a secret world of enslavement no less, that was to be the Dark Lord's ultimate achievement. To simply make his enemies disappear without a trace would certainly have been the perfect crime, even though it would have required tremendous effort. Cube tells me that the Dark Lord decided to hold off on his plans until the world forgot about him—simply choosing to wait in this next dimension until the right moment to return. My subject puts his hands in his face as the waiter hands me the bill. "He's paying," I say, as I gather my belongings and briskly leave the booth. Ice Cube's sobs of sorrow echo behind me..._

Mr. Jackson carefully placed down his copy of the _Daily Prophet_ and looked across the breakfast table at Ice Cube.

"What part of 'don't even _utter_ the word Voldemort' does your negro ass not understand?"

Cube slouched into his seat. "Man, I didn't say shit. I didn't even know I was talking to that reporter. She definitely didn't look like the picture here." Cube pointed to the tiny portrait of Skeeter that ran alongside the article—the woman with thick red lipstick and tiny glasses on the end of her nose smirked up at them.

"She's done that to me," Hermione said as both she and Cho joined them at the table. "She often uses the Polyjuice Potion to change what she looks like."

"Goddamn, Cube," Mr. Jackson exclaimed as he continued to read the article. "I don't even understand how you ended up in Hogsmeade after everything that's been going down."

Cube was shaking his head. "Fucking online wizard dating. Now you've gotta deal with people not looking like their profile pics _after_ you've already met them. That's some serious bullshit." He stared desperately at Mr. Jackson. "Nothing in this paper is true. You've gotta believe me."

Mr. Jackson had already begun to fold up the paper. "It doesn't have to be true. It's still enough for the Ministry to take action." He noticed Cube's solemn expression and punched him in the shoulder. "We'll figure something out. Let's meet with the others tonight." He leaned back in his seat and took a glance around the Great Hall. Though it was the first meal back since the break, the hall was still partially empty—many parents hadn't wanted their children to return to Hogwarts following the incident on the Quidditch field.

An incident which had left seventeen seriously injured and two dead.

Though the majority of the school was able to swallow the deaths of the students with unfortunate ease (now that they had some practice with such a happenstance), one student who had been unable to sleep since the audience towers fell, walked through the Hogwarts hallways alone, silently wandering while the rest of the student body moved on without him.

Harry Potter felt responsible. Not just for the deaths of Hannah Abbott and Ernest Macmillan—the two Hufflepuffs who had been sitting next to each other when their world crumbled beneath them. But for everything. For the death of Cedric Diggory. For the war that Voldemort was bringing to the wizarding world. For what happened to Cho. For what was happening to Ron. For the darkness that was blanketing itself upon his peers. Everything that had happened for the past four and a half years found its roots in him. He was the boy who lived, yes, but he was also the boy whose life caused death. Endless death.

Though he could walk the halls for hours without uttering a word to the friends that passed him by, or even the professors who called out his name with some level of uncertainty, he was still well aware of what was happening to the school. He could feel it. The sense of purpose the school once carried seemed to have slipped away. Study for seven years, graduate, get a good job, get married, have kids, rinse, and repeat. With a future that seemed as up in the air as the weather itself, many believed their continuing education at Hogwarts to be a pointless endeavour.

Harry was finding it harder to disagree. Earlier in the year though, he had for a moment actually considered taking matters into his own hands, forming a secret alliance run by those who wanted _real_ change. It was here that students could learn proper forms of self defense, could talk about the political happenings of the outside world without fear of repercussion, and generally feel, in the grand scheme of things, like they mattered. But the moment had left him—and now, half of those he had considered for this collective were no longer at Hogwarts while the other half were no longer speaking to him. In another world he thought, or perhaps another life, it could have been something great.

His steps around the Hogwarts castle had brought him to the gargoyle at the base entrance of Dumbledore's office. Had he really been aimlessly wandering? The school may have lost his sense of purpose, but he hadn't yet lost his. Not completely anyways.

He whispered the secret password to make the gargoyle jump to the side. Hogwarts was the only home he knew. And if he was going to protect it, if not for him, but for those he still cared about, he had to do whatever it took to keep it safe. He took one step forward, and then another, slowly following the darkness that wound its way up to the Headmaster's office.

Later that night, in the Negus common room, Mr. Jackson was leading a circle of the house members—attempting to get everybody's input on how they should proceed with the current situation.

While some felt that they should stay at Hogwarts and finish the year through—both Barry and Mr. Jackson were convinced that the magical castle was the safest place to be—the vast majority were ready to pack their bags and leave. Surprisingly, this majority also included Hermione who, despite her immense displeasure at the thought of not passing her O.W.L.'s, was no longer purely concerned for her own safety; she wanted to take Cho home.

Unsurprisingly, the only member of House Negus who wanted to travel through the dimension door and bring back Neville Longbottom, was Ice Cube.

"Where is Cube anyways?" Mr. Jackson asked, just now realizing that his friend was nowhere to be seen. "It was his idea to go back into the dimension to save that… was it Shortbottom?"

"Come to think of it," Buggin' Out replied, craning his neck to count the other brothers. "I haven't seen him since breakfast. He wasn't in Dimensional Derivations."

"And he wasn't in Herbology," said Hermione.

"I didn't see him in Potions," added Barry.

Suddenly, there was a loud _SNAP_ by the fireplace and the house members turned their heads just in time to see Dobby emerge from the embers. Dusting the ashes from his apron, he stepped down off the hearth and ran straight up to Mr. Jackson, tugging the end of his sleeves with urgency.

"Former slave master has your friend, Mr. Ice Tea!"

"You mean, Ice Cube?!" Mr. Jackson exclaimed. "What do you mean, they have him?"

The house elf was so nervous that his legs couldn't stop shaking. "Dobby was just minding his own business on the edge of the forbidden forest—"

Dean Thomas cut in, "What were _you_ doing on the edge of the forbidden forest?"

The house elf rubbed his chin and thought carefully about his answer, "Dobby was participating in recreational activities."

Mr. Jackson shook his head. "There's no time! What did you see?"

"Dobby watched two men and three women marching Mr. Cube across the grounds. Former slave master number two, McGonagall, was walking behind them."

"That has to be the Ministry of Magic," said Hermione. "But they couldn't possibly be going into the dimension door tonight?"

"I'm not waiting around to find out," Mr. Jackson grabbed his wand and motioned Buggin' Out to follow him.

"I'm coming too," started Hermione before noticing the sullen eyes of her partner in the common room entrance. "On second thought…"

"Go," said Cho. "They need you more than I do."

"You got that right," mumbled Buggin' Out, staring nervously at Mr. Jackson's wand. "You know how to use that thing yet?"

"Fuck yeah. I conjured up a Fanged Geranium," he announced proudly. "Tell 'em, Hermione."

Hermione bit her lip and replied, "I mean… technically speaking, he did do that."

Buggin' Out was still staring at the wand. "You made a plant grow?"

"It looks more impressive than it sounds."

"Uh huh."

Barry walked across and common room to Mr. Jackson and tugged on his robes.

"Sorry, little man," said Mr. Jackson. "But I need you to sit this one out. Dobby, do ya mind keeping my man company while we're gone?"

The house elf bowed—accepting the task at hand.

As Mr. Jackson opened the front door of the Negus House, he recognized the smell that Dobby had brought into the common room. He called back, "And please keep it a PG environment!"

"They've been gone a long time," Barry said, as he began reshuffling the deck of cards. Two hours had passed since the trio of Mr. Jackson, Buggin' Out, and Hermione embarked on their journey to find Cube. Though most of the other House of Negus members had gone off to sleep, Barry, Dobby, and Cho instead sat cross legged by the fireplace, awaiting their friends' return.

"Hogwarts is a big place and they don't know where they're going," Cho rationalized, cutting the deck of playing cards in front of her. "I'm not surprised it's taking them so long but I'm sure Hermione will figure something out."

"Oooooh, you _believe_ in Hermione, don't you?" cooed Barry.

"Shut up, kid," snapped Cho.

The house elf suddenly stood up straight. "Dobby has an idea!" He snapped his fingers and with an uncomfortable cracking sound he was gone.

"Where'd he—"

SNAP.

Dobby had returned, holding the hand of a bewildered Ron Weasley.

"Um… hello," Ron whispered, first turning his head with wonder at the House of Negus common space (which was miles below the Hogwarts grandeur that he was used to), but then coming to an unsteady halt when he noticed Cho sitting on the carpet. His eyes widened.

"Oh… hi Cho—"

"AVADA KEDAVRA!" A bolt of green lightning flashed out of the end of Cho's wand, slicing across the room in an instant, and just barely missing the shoulder of the petrified Gryffindor.

Ron slowly turned his head to peek at his singed, smoking shoulder blade.

Cho marched up to Ron and grabbed him by his throat and, much to Cho's own surprise, easily lifted him several feet off the ground. "Give me one reason why I shouldn't beat the shit out of you right now."

Ron, whose eyes were closed tightly and his expression perpetually grimaced, nodded his head slightly towards the bottom of his robe.

Dobby took the cue and dug into Ron's pockets, withdrawing a folded piece of parchment.

"I can help your girlfriend!" Ron cried out, his thick sobs making him an unpleasant sight to look at. "It's the Marauder's Map. You can use it to find her."

"Why do you have it?"

Ron continued to sob but maintained his silence. Cho tightened her grip. "I'm not going to ask again." She raised her wand and pointed the tip at the centre of his temple. "And I won't miss again either."

"I stole it from Harry's room," he admitted through a gasp of air. His cheeks were starting to turn red as Cho continued to apply pressure to his throat.

The house elf stared up at them both, nervously watching the exchange unfold before him. "Dobby thinks you should let him go now," he said shakily.

Cho ignored him and continued to press into Ron. " _Why_ did you steal it?"

"I… I was using it to…" A terrible sucking sound fell out of Ron's throat as he gasped for air. His eyes rolled back as he began to lose consciousness. Cho slightly loosened her grip and dropped her wand. With her free arm, she punched him in the stomach. When he didn't react, she punched him again, and again. At this point, Dobby could no longer stand by and watch. The house elf, leapt on Cho's arm and attempted to unhook her fingers from around the Weasley boys' throat. Sadly for Dobby, he was unable to put up much of a fight against the heavy weight chaser, who shook her arm in one swift motion, sending the house elf flying across the common room. She turned her attention back to Ron and punched him in the gut again. This time, she triggered an immediate resurgence and Ron sprung back to life. He slowly breathed in as tears ran down his face.

"Try that again," started Cho. "And I'll beat the shit out of you and _then_ bring you back to life. You were saying?"

"I was using it... to spy on you," he finished.

Cho dropped Ron to the ground who, upon smashing to his knees, lurched forward and immediately took a deep inhale.

"I thought... I just… I just wanted to know what you were doing… that I wasn't… that was making her so happy." His nose was running and a giant piece of snot hung from one nostril, almost touching the floor. "Please don't kill me," he sobbed.

Suddenly remembering about Dobby, Cho spun around to see the house elf upside down, crashed against the bookshelf. She hurried over to help the house elf who was just starting to collect himself. "I'm so sorry," she started, reaching out to help him.

Dobby winced at her touch and pulled back. "Dobby is strong."

"How did you know he had the map?" she asked softly.

"He tried to trade it to Dobby."

"For what?"

"He wants the same thing Dobby wants..." The house elf trailed off momentarily but then continued on after a beat, "He wants to feel good again." Dobby withdrew his vapourizer and began to inhale. "He wants to forget about things he cannot change."

Cho turned back to the battered Ron Weasley, who lay on the ground, still clutching the area of his neck where she had pressed her fingernails into his skin. She crouched down by his head and watched him in silence, following his broken breaths as the fireplace crackled on.

"I'm sorry you had to see all this, Barry. I didn't mean for it to…" She turned her head back to comfort the young wizard but he, and the Marauder's Map, were already long gone.

"Where are you going, Barry?" the young wizard said to himself as he hurriedly, and somewhat blindly, followed the map through the Hogwarts hallways. Though he could see the dots on the map indicating where Mr. Jackson and Hermione were (around the Transfiguration corridor), Cube, Professor McGonagall, and several others were congregated in what seemed to be in an unmarked area "off" the map—Barry couldn't explain it but their dots weren't actually attached to the paper itself; they seemed to be floating in some strange blurry zone about an inch from the parchment. He noticed that Buggin' Out, who for whatever reason had found himself separated from the pair, was close to that area anyways so he decided to head in that direction.

Wisely choosing a path that would keep him from running into Peeves the poltergeist, the map led him past the East Wing, past the moonlit courtyard, past the the staff room, and up the grand staircase where he screeched to a halt. Two dots were stopped just feet away from him—he crouched down behind the banister to remain out of sight.

"What do you mean I have to show you my ID?" Buggin' Out threw up his arms furiously as the Hogwarts caretaker (and notorious hall monitor) Argus Filch, blocked his way. "I ain't ever had to show anyone my ID here before."

"It's school policy," Filch replied stoically. "Anyone wandering around the halls at this hour of the night is getting checked out. I have better things to do with my evening than chase down you Negus people."

Buggin' Out dug into his pocket for his wallet and slipped out his ID. "For the record, I do _not_ like the way you just said Negus," he said, handing the card over.

Filch reached into his pocket and withdrew his glasses. He squinted at the card as two bulky figures creeped down at the end of the hall behind him.

"Yo!" Buggin' Out called out. "Yo!" He pointed towards Crabbe and Goyle who were slothing suspiciously through the hallway's shadows. "Aren't you going to check _them_ out?"

Making it seem like it required all the energy in the world to do so, Filch barely turned his head back to acknowledge Buggin' Out's concerns. He returned his attention to the ID inspection. "They're clear."

"Are you kidding me?"

Filch glanced up at him over the tip of his lenses. "Alright, you're good," he said finally, holding back out the card. "Do yourself a favour and go back to your House. We'll all sleep better knowing you're not wandering these halls by yourself." Without waiting for a reply, he turned his back to him and limped off down the hallway, returning to the darkness offered by the aging castle.

Barry took advantage of the opportunity to get his attention.

"Psst!"

Buggin' Out spun around as Barry emerged from behind the banister. "Barry? Can you believe this bullshit? I bet half the students here don't even carry IDs."

"Why aren't you with Mr. Jackson?"

"I stopped to use the washroom. When a brotha's gotta go, a brotha's gotta go. I told them I'd only be thirty seconds and they _still_ left without me." He noticed the piece of parchment in Barry's hand. "What's that you've got there?"

"It's the Marauder's Map. It lets me see—"

"I'm not an idiot, little man. I can figure out what it does." He took the map from Barry and held it above his head to get better lighting. "I see Cube is hangin' with Minerva McGonagall, Cornelius Fudge, Tom Riddle…"

"Let me see that!" Barry snatched the map back, his eyes widening as he confirmed the name for himself. After quickly tucking the map into his inner robe (a feat that came with some small difficulty thanks to his missing arm), he withdrew his wand, whispered _Lumos_ , and turned back to Buggin' Out. "I think we need to get the house elves. Cube is in big trouble."


	17. Chapter 17

**The Exit Strategy**

The Ministry of Magic was forcing Ice Cube to stare into the Mirror of Erised. The Negus member didn't know how he came to be standing in the Room of Requirement, nor did he understand why so many professors and government officials seemed to be staring so intensely at him. He remembered eating breakfast earlier that morning in the Great Hall, stepping outside briefly for a breath of fresh air, and then… closing his eyes. The next time he opened them was thirty seconds ago.

He shrugged the hand of Cornelius Fudge off his shoulder. "Hey man, I think you've got the wrong guy."

"So you're awake," started the Minister of Magic as he turned to face Professor McGonagall. "I thought you said the bewitched spell was indefinite?"

"The Room of Requirement does not abide by the same laws of magic that we do," McGonagall replied softly. She hurried over to Cube and motioned towards the mirror. "We just want you to tell us what you see, dear."

Cube raised an eyebrow at McGonagall's forced politeness. "I don't... see anything," he replied slowly.

"He needs a prompt, Minerva," said Fudge. "Of course the boy's not going to see anything if he doesn't know what he _should_ be seeing."

Cube blinked his head back. "Who are you calling 'boy', _nigga_?"

McGonagall placed a hand back on Cube's shoulder to align him directly with the mirror. "Please… I need you to focus. Tell me what you see."

Cube continued to stare blankly at his own reflection. "Lady, I'm telling you, I don't see—"

Suddenly, the ceiling above Cube tore in half revealing the purple oval in the sky that was currently burning above Hogwarts. The dimension door that seemed to be sucking up everything below it—including crumbling spires and chimneys from the disintegrating castle—was larger than any that Cube had ever seen, or even thought possible. With gravity unable to win against the pull of the door, and while more and more pieces were lifted up and absorbed into the great aerial whirlpool, the door began to grow—bigger and bigger until it had encapsulated the entire sky. Was he looking into the dimension door… or out?

Fudge slapped Cube on the back and the fiery vortex vanished, returning the world to its normal state. Cube blinked at the mirror before him, unsure of if he had imagined what had just happened.

"So he _did_ see something! Splendid!" Fudge exclaimed as he waved his wand to summon a bottle of champagne. With another twirl of his wrist, the cap popped open, making way for a pool of foam. "Shall we drink to this then?"

"I think the occasion certainly calls for it," replied Rufus Scrimgeour. Cube turned around at the sound of a voice of which he was unfamiliar. Scrimgeour was Fudge's second in command at the Ministry of Magic—a role he had been appointed to following the events of the Triwizard Tournament. Though there were still many who had confidence in Fudge's abilities as government leader, several felt he might benefit from an extra pair of eyes on any forthcoming situations.

"Now then," Fudge started again as he handed Cube a glass of champagne. "Do you mind telling us what you saw?"

Cube looked back to the mirror, and then to McGonagall and then to Fudge. He crossed his arms and replied, "Man, I didn't see shit."

Fudge raised his glass and began drinking it slowly—keeping his eyes glued to Cube until he had finished it in one prolonged gulp. "I see." He tossed the glass but before it could shatter on the floor, he twirled his wand again and it vanished in a pop. "Minerva? Perhaps you should write this down so that we have it on record."

McGonagall gave Cube a nervous and somewhat hopeful glance that he would comply with the Ministry's inquiries. She conjured up a quill and paper, nodded her head, and began to write.

"The boy says he saw the Dark Lord in the mirror," Fudge began.

"Hey, wait a minute. No, I—" Cube tried to cut in.

"He claims the Dark Lord called to him. He gave him instructions on where to meet him in the other dimension. He says that the only way to exact the location of He-Who-Should-Not-Be-Named is to let the mirror guide the way. Clever really. Hiding the map in a mirror that will only reveal itself to those who are completely committed to the Dark Lord's reign of terror. Your deepest desire is to serve your master, isn't it? It's a pity he failed to realize that we are always two steps ahead of him."

"That's bullshit!" yelled Cube. "And you can stop writing that shit down!" he screamed at McGonagall (her quill was writing of its own accord anyways and continued to scribble). "I didn't see any of that. When the mirror changed, there was no goddamn map!"

"Oh? But I thought you didn't see anything at all?" A slight grin grew across Fudge's face. "Do you see the type of game you've got yourself into now, _boy_? How about we start again?"

Before Fudge could continue, a dot of light appeared between them, starting off as a tiny orb, but then spinning out and expanding—stretching its sides until it had become a visible purple oval that was unmistakably a new dimension door.

Fudge jumped back as the door stopped growing but continued to glow before them. "What's the meaning of this?" he asked as both Koreander and Dumbledore stepped out, their wands at the ready.

"I'm disappointed in you, Minerva," Dumbledore said wearily. "I thought we had agreed that the best course of action was to send an exhibition first."

"I'm sorry, Professor… but the Dark Lord has to be stopped. And I'm afraid that we won't get another chance."

Taking in the other players of the room one by one, Dumbledore sighed as he flicked his wrist. Without hesitation, the door shrank back down to a singularity before popping out of existence. "I understand your concern, Minerva. But I'm afraid I'm going to have to let you go." McGonagall lowered her head in shame. "And as for the two of you," he said, turning to the Ministry officials, "I'd appreciate it you would keep your nose in government affairs so that I can keep my old nose in mine."

"Hogwarts is now a government affair, Headmaster," replied Scrimgeour. "You would do best to accept that and move out of the way. "We have a statement from the boy and it's all we need to close off the dimension door for good."

"Hey man," Cube protested to Dumbledore, "I didn't say shit to either of them. It's all made up just like that article."

"The Rita Skeeter one?" Fudge recalled fondly. "I thought it was so good that it deserved a Pulitzer Prize… and she's not even American!" He looked cautiously at Dumbledore's wrist. "You two may want to consider dropping your wands unless your intention is to make us feel threatened."

Before Dumbledore could reply, the Room of Requirement shook itself and its temporary entrance shifted into focus as Harry Potter walked through.

Harry had been making regular trips to the Room of Requirement lately, mostly for the solitude but sometimes to see his parents. After a discussion with Dumbledore on how he might defeat Voldemort once and for all, he needed to clear his head and seriously consider the consequences that might arise from applying the Kamikaze curse on himself. The idea stemmed from the actions of his deceased mother: before she died, she placed a counter-charm on Harry, which was largely deemed responsible for the deadly reflection that occurred when Voldemort attempted to kill him. If he could do something similar now—such as, make himself explosive if a certain spell was ever used against him, he could potentially take the Dark Lord out in one blow. The only problem was ensuring that it was in fact the Dark Lord that dealt the final blow to Harry.

As he stepped into the Room of Requirement, his head buried deeply in his own thoughts on how he should proceed, he jumped, startled upon finding the party that was gathered before him.

"What's _he_ doing here?!" shouted Scrimgeour as he withdrew his own wand.

"Put that away," replied Fudge. "Potter's no concern to us."

Cube, who had somehow managed to lose his prominence in this conversation, decided to take advantage of the opportunity and slowly began inching away. He came to a sudden halt when his eyes accidentally glanced again at the mirror. He looked over at Scrimgeour, back to the mirror, and then back to Scrimgeour. The Ministry official had previously been standing just out of the mirror's line of sight which is why Cube had been unable to see the phenomenon currently taking place in the reflection. Though the ceiling wasn't torn apart, the sky wasn't a giant dimension door, and the Room of Requirement was just like any other room at Hogwarts, there was one very big difference between the mirror world and the real one. Scrimgeour's reflection wasn't Scrimgeour. Scrimgeour's reflection was the reflection of Lord Voldemort.

Forgetting about the wand he had previously equipped and held in the striking position, Cube dropped it to the floor and instead dug into his belt buckle and withdrew the piece he had imported from Hogsmeade. He aimed the revolver at Scrimgeour and fired.

Without blinking, Scrimgeour deflected the bullets away but lost the concentration required to keep his form as the Ministry's second in command—he transformed back into Voldemort as the others watched on in horror.

"What I want to know," said Voldemort, cracking his neck when he finished growing into his original body, "Is how you managed to get that gun in here. I was under the impression that Albus here had a 'no technology' rule at Hogwarts."

Everyone turned their heads to Dumbledore for his answer. The headmaster shrugged and replied, "Well, it's more of a guideline than anything. Magic tends to interfere with anything that runs on electricity. But that doesn't mean students aren't allowed to bring say... their portable devices, given they can find a pocket of Hogwarts where it will actually work."

Cube stepped forward. "Yeah, bitch! Plus, bullets don't run on batteries!" Without waiting for the conclusion of the standoff, he began unloading another round into Voldemort who quickly summoned up an energy shield. Fudge and McGonagall leapt out of the way as the bullets ricocheted off the Dark Lord's defense.

Meanwhile, Barry and Buggin' Out had managed to find Mr. Jackson and Hermione and had together made their way to the entrance of the Room of Requirement.

"Do you think they're inside there?" Mr. Jackson asked. He looked closely at the wall before them—under normal circumstances, he probably would have passed it by, but now, looking at it up close, he could tell that there was something off about it. That the wall was _glowing_ probably wasn't the right way of describing it. _Buzzing_ , perhaps, would be more accurate.

"I'm pretty sure," replied Barry, holding up the map in front of his nose. "But it doesn't say how to get in."

"Where's the house elf?" Mr. Jackson craned his neck.

" _Dobby_..." Hermione corrected, slightly annoyed at the phrasing of the question, "... is on his way here. He said he had to make a pit stop first. And…" She trailed off as the unmistakable sound of gunfire echoed distantly beyond the entrance wall.

Mr. Jackson removed his reading glasses and withdrew his wand. "Cube?"

Inside the Room of Requirement, there had already been a casualty. In an effort to escape, Voldemort had summoned what he referred to as a reverse dimension door. Several months ago, Voldemort had no intention of returning to Hogwarts or even the wizarding world for that matter. But when he left this universe and began to travel through new worlds via the dimension doors, he stumbled upon a fascinating discovery. By reversing the wrist motion used to create the door, he could effectively turn the door around. Whereas before, a wizard might enter the door normally and then find themselves riding a kind of wormhole to the next dimension, in this scenario, the wormhole came first. Meaning, the dimension door was now actually a vacuum.

By planting enough of these 'vacuums', he had a surefire way to sabotage the wizarding world before he left it for good. And when he received reports from his band of Death Eaters that they had captured the real Rufus Scrimgeour, he decided 'what the hell' and sought to put this idea into action.

Voldemort knew he would be unable to escape through the reverse dimension door without a hostage. Hence, he grabbed the person nearest to him: Professor McGonagall. Unfortunately for them both, McGonagall was able to squirm away in a single motion, leaving the Dark Lord with no choice but to change tactics and raise his wand against her. Dumbledore, who had been holding onto Cube to prevent him from flying into the dimension and thus had no hands free, forced himself to watch as his friend collapsed to her knees as the green flash reflected in his spectacles. Harry, who had managed to momentarily back away from the action, crouched down behind some dusty old crates while the room around him began to inch towards the new dimension door. He closed his eyes and settled on the decision that had been keeping him up at night; withdrawing his wand, he managed to push past his final moments of hesitation and placed the Kamikaze spell on himself. He could already feel his fingers begin to tingle.

Voldemort twirled his wand and the wormhole began to expand. Objects from all over the room were now flying through the door as its gravity intensified. Koreander, who was still trying to figure out his place in all of this, was desperately relying on his own weight to cling to the floor. But as he slowly slid toward the door, he was beginning to lose hope. He just barely managed to move his head out of the way as the Mirror of Erised was ripped off its wall support and soared through the door. Much like the out-of-control door he had conjured during his inaugural Dimensional Derivations class, he had been unable to close this one (though he barely had time to try before he lost his footing and the suction power began to overwhelm him).

Cube, who had lost his piece to the vacuum as soon as it opened, was doing his best to hold onto Dumbledore when he began to hear voices on the other side of the Room of Requirement's entrance.

"Are you in there?" He could only just make out a faint, familiar voice beyond the wall.

"You're going to need to yell! I can't hear shit in here!"

"Dobby is here to save the day!"

"Dobby? Shit's going down, but I don't know how to let you in."

"Do you have any green with you?" the house elf yelled back.

"Cron? Dammit Dobby, now's not the time for—"

"YES or NO?"

Cube relented. "Yeah, of course I do but—"

The door to the Room of Requirement sprung open and an army of house elves on broomsticks came rushing in, with Barry, Mr. Jackson and the other core Negus members following closely behind.

"What the shit—" said Voldemort as Dobby and the house elves rammed into his legs at full speed forcing him to lose his balance and tumble forwards, head first into his own wormhole. At the last second, however, he managed to catch onto the edge of the door, and hung tightly as the vortex pulled him in. Winky, who along with the other house elves was now circling back around the room, realized that the initial strike hadn't accomplished what they sought. He turned to Dobby who was zooming alongside him on his own broomstick.

"Winky is sorry, brother," he said to him.

"Why—"

Before he could finish, Winky pushed Dobby off his broomstick and, along with the remaining house elves, formed a flying V and ripped ahead, charging directly into the Dark Lord at full speed.

"Winky, no!" Dobby cried as the house elves impacted with Voldemort, forcing all of them through the reverse dimension door.

Suddenly, the door began expanding outwards again.

"Now Hermione!" Dumbledore called out just as his own spectacles were sucked off of his face.

Nodding her understanding, the former Gryffindor twirled her wand and shouted triumphantly, " _Confectrix!_ "

Without delay, the reverse dimension door made a churning sound, slowed its spin to a halt and began rotating in the opposite direction. Within seconds it had contracted back to a singularity of purple light and then, with a pop, to nothing.

"Well done, Miss Granger," Dumbledore said wearily, finally letting go of Cube who dusted himself off and took a survey of the damage around the room. Dumbledore turned to Koreander, who hadn't yet managed to pull himself off the ground. "Perhaps we should restore Dimensional Derivations to a practical learning course after all. I now see how short-sighted I was to ban dimension practice at Hogwarts… I do hope you'll forgive me, Karl."

Koreander rose to his feet, just happy to be alive. He grunted something that sounded like an OK.

"But Professor," Hermione started. "How did you know that I'd continue to practice dimensional derivations even though you told the students that it wasn't allowed?"

Mr. Jackson stepped forward. "Are you shitting me, Hermione? There ain't nothing that's gonna stop you from getting shit done. You're one bad ass mothafucka."

Barry chimed in, "You are actually the best, Hermione. I'm glad you decided to join our house."

"Remind me never to pick a fight with you," added Cube, who slapped Mr. Jackson on the shoulder as the group huddled up together.

"Aw, you guys…" Hermione's face turned red as she retreated back slightly. As Dobby sauntered solemnly over to join the circle, who Cube immediately embraced, she noticed Harry standing by himself in the corner of the room, watching the scene from afar. She politely motioned for a path out of the crowd and timidly stepped over to him with her head bowed down—it was in this moment that she realized she hadn't actually spoken to him properly in months.

"How are you doing?" she asked.

Harry continued to look past her at the lifeless body of Professor McGonagall. "I'm fine."

She started to turn away but then forced herself to continue, "It's just… I haven't really seen you around much lately… and I know part of that was because I left Gryffindor and maybe part of that was because of what happened between me and Ron. But I wanted you to know that even if you need to be loyal to him… which is something I get… I really, really get…I'll always be around, if you ever do need me and... Harry?"

She reached out to touch his face but he flinched and pulled away.

Her voice started to break. "You think I don't know that something's wrong? That I don't see you sitting by yourself in the Great Hall or not showing up to class? What happened, Harry? You were the first friend I ever made here and now it feels like we barely ever knew each other. And I just don't understand how things can change so quickly. Are you mad at me? Did I not try hard enough? I thought I was putting in a good effort before we stopped talking but… maybe I could still try harder. Is this about Cho? You don't still like her do you? I never meant to steal her away or anything it just sort of… happened. And I don't want you to think that I left the House because of anything to do with you… the timing was just right for me to try something new. I've made some great new friends and learned plenty of new things but I'd still like for you to be a part of it all, somehow. Please? Can you even still hear me? Where are you in there?"

Something beneath Harry's skin felt like it was on fire; it was a layer of burning unlike any he had ever felt (and much worse than when he fell off his broomstick during the Quidditch match he saw the Dementors). He clenched his fists to make it go away. He hadn't told Hermione about the Kamikaze Spell, nor Ron, nor Sirius, nor anyone really besides Dumbledore (who himself had told him that they would find a better way). And he _could_ see the visible hurt in Hermione's face that he wasn't responding to her friendship but, he resolved, it was for her own good. They were on separate paths now and the level of happiness she had found in Cho, was something he himself would never know.

Taking his silence as her answer, Hermione left him standing there, stepping over Cornelius Fudge as she returned to her group of friends. The Minister of Magic had yet to find his footing and was still crawling on the ground, slithering on the floor like a slug in the aftermath of the vortex.

Dumbledore extended his hand out to him and said, "It must have been quite a shock to find out that your partner was the Dark Lord all along. You two always did seem to be very close."

Fudge accepted the support and was pulled to his feet. "It was a shock," he replied, eyeing Dumbledore carefully as he began to brush the dust off his silver robes. "And yes, we were."

"Do you have any idea where the real Rufus Scrimgeour might be?"

"I haven't the slightest." Fudge pretended to be busy rubbing the dirt off his glasses—he hadn't been Minister for six years to not immediately know where this conversation was headed. "Do you have something you'd like to ask me, Headmaster?"

A telling sadness emerged on Dumbledore's face as he looked over, longingly at the Negus members that were still in mid-celebration.

" _Expelliarmus_!"

" _Stupefy_!"

The huddled students spun around just as Dumbledore fell to his knees and then collapsed to one side. Fudge made a quick motion with his wand and yet another dimension door spun into existence in front of them. Before anyone could react, dozens of Ministry officials leapt out of the door with their wands already prepped—they began circling the students as Fudge bent down to retrieve the wand that Dumbledore had blown out of his grip.

"HANDS IN THE AIR!"

"DROP THE WANDS! NOW!"

"Who the fuck are you?"

"DON'T LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT THE GROUND!"

"Man," Ice Cube said as he joined the others in throwing his wand into a pile at their feet. "I'm never using online dating again."

"Just stay calm," Mr. Jackson whispered. "At least they don't know about your piece. I heard the shots—that was yours, right?"

Cube lowered his head. "Yeah, but—"

"Yeah, but what?"

He motioned toward the dimension door with his chin. "It's no longer with us."

"Goddamnit, we're fucked."

"HEY, SHUT THE FUCK UP." One of the ministry officials punched Cube in the stomach; the blow instantly dropped him to his knees.

"What are you doing?!" Hermione screamed. " _You_ work for the ministry! You know we have rights!"

" _Right_." The official and leader of the group, Pius Thicknesse, chuckled as he twirled his finger—signalling his underlings to place the students under arrest. One by one, the members of House Negus were made to step forward as an officer twisted their arms behind their back and chanted _Catena_. A purple thread of electricity twisted into the shape of a pair of handcuffs and wrapped itself around their wrists.

"What about him?" the handcuffing officer asked when he reached Barry. "He's only got the one arm."

"Are you telling me you wouldn't be able to take down a cripple if he tried anything funny? Don't waste your time on him."

The officer moved on to Dobby who slowly turned his head up to Mr. Jackson and winked.

"Dammit, house elf don't you dare—"

"Dobby, will save the day! Dobby will be back with the help!" Before the officer had a chance to conjure the handcuffing spell, Dobby squirmed his arm out, snapped a finger, and disappeared with a swift _CRACK_.

Thicknesse called out, "Imbecile! What is that racket?! Is there a problem?" The officer was currently debriefing the situation with Fudge.

The officer momentarily thought about reporting Dobby's escape but, after realizing that nobody else would notice the missing presence of a three foot tall house elf, he shrugged and continued down the line.

Koreander whispered into Mr. Jackson's ear, "I have a plan. But I'll need you to be quick."

"You too?" Mr. Jackson replied. "Is everyone here some kind of superhero?"

"I have another wand in my belt," he continued. "On the count of three I want you to—"

" _AVADA KEDAVRA_!" A burst of green light hit Koreander square in the chest and the aging professor, who didn't even have a chance to see his life flash before his eyes, but saw instead, the dimension door that continued to spin before him, closed his eyes for the last time and fell backwards.

Mr. Jackson leapt back. "Jesus Christ!"

Fudge blew smoke off the tip of his wand and stepped forward. "I could hear what he was whispering from across the room. What did he think was going to happen?"

Mr. Jackson spat at the Minister's feet. "You're an actual piece of shit," he snarled.

"Careful," Fudge said, bringing the tip of his wand closer. "It's already warmed up."

Behind several crates on the other side of the room, and out of sight from the current happenings, Harry Potter watched silently as two officers picked up the unconscious Dumbledore and carried him through the dimension door. Harry placed his hand on his chest and waited. His heartbeat was already three times faster than it was ten minutes ago. The feeling that was beginning to overtake him—this, inner burning—was on the verge of reaching the surface at any moment.

"Mr. Potter!" Fudge called out suddenly. "Did you think I had forgotten about you?"

Harry peeked his head out from behind the crates to see the Minister staring in his direction.

"Plotting a bold rescue, are we? You're a bit late to the party." He smirked, motioning towards the stiff body of Koreander.

Harry took a step forward.

"Right there is fine. And I'll need you to drop your wand while you're at it."

Harry took another step forward.

"I said, stop right there! Can somebody _please_ arrest him?"

Yet another step.

Fudge rose his arm slowly

"Sir!" The handcuffing officer shouted out, alarmed at what was currently transpiring. "The Dark Lord wants him alive—"

"The Dark Lord isn't here!" A small bead of sweat ran down the Minister's neck as Harry continued to move forward. "I don't want to… but I will!"

"Harry, stop!" Hermione cried. The Boy Who Lived stopped in his tracks and turned his head. It only lasted for a fraction of a moment, but Hermione was sure that Harry had managed to crack a hopeful smile, a smile that was just for her, which brought her back to the very first day they met aboard the Hogwarts Express.

She screamed in horror as Fudge threw his arm down and a green bolt of lightning tore across the room. The only pain Harry felt, before the Kamikaze spell took effect and obliterated his body and the officers around him, was a slight irritation in the scar on his forehead. He thought about his parents and wondered, if they were thinking about him.

The resulting shockwave from Harry's explosion swept Fudge and his officers off their feet and nearly wiped out half the room in the process.

Mr. Jackson coughed through the cloud of dust that was currently shrouding the room in a brownish haze. The wall entrance had been completely destroyed. With the handcuffing officer knocked out, the spell and magical bonds were broken and the electrical restraints dissolved away.

"That's our ticket out of here," he said, rubbing his sore wrists after the cuffs had worn off. "Is everyone alright?"

Buggin' Out groaned. Hermione was sobbing quietly to herself.

"Mr. Jackson?" Barry called out quietly. Mr. Jackson could hear the shaking in his voice.

The dust began to settle and the picture became clear—Fudge was holding Barry by the collar, pointing the wand at his temple as he attempted to distance himself from the Negus members and inch toward the dimension door.

"Leave the boy out of this!" yelled Mr. Jackson.

"We're going to leave now," Fudge replied, raggedly exhaling the dust that his lungs had inhaled. "I suggest you—"

Suddenly, Barry twisted Fudge's wand downward, forcing the Minister to shoot himself in the foot with a _Stupefy_ spell. As if he had been handed a cue, Ice Cube broke into a sprint towards them. "FUCK THE POLICE!" he yelled as he rammed into Fudge, forcing the three of them through the dimension door all at once. The door's spin churned to a halt and began the process of rapid contraction, shrinking toward a point of singularity before it popped away, leaving Mr. Jackson no choice but to hoist the inconsolable Hermione to her feet. With the support of Buggin' Out, the trio pushed themselves away from the rubble—stepping over the bodies of the Ministry officials as they left the Room of Requirement behind them.


	18. Chapter 18

**The Help**

"Dobby, where are you taking me?" Dean Thomas asked, rubbing his eyes as the house elf led him out of the Hogwarts grounds and toward Hogsmeade. "Couldn't this have waited until morning?"

"Our friends are in trouble," Dobby replied. "But Dobby knows how we can save them."

He grabbed Dobby's arm. "What do you mean our friends are in trouble?"

"The Ministry took them captive. They arrested Ice Tea, Mr. Jackson, and then everyone else."

"They what?!" Dean stopped in his tracks and turned around, staring back at the darkened castle that was now far off in the distance. "We can't just leave them behind. We have to go back for them!"

"It's too late," the house elf said grimly. "Professor McGonagall is dead and they have arrested former slave master Dumbledore."

"McGonagall is dead? What the fuck!"

"And my brothers…"

After explaining everything that went down in the Room of Requirement, the pair continued the rest of the journey in silence, finding themselves on the edge of Hogsmeade just as the sun was starting to come up.

"He's in here," said Dobby as he motioned toward _The Three Broomsticks Inn_.

As it was well past last call, and way before it was set to open officially, they entered the pub to find it more or less deserted. In the wizarding community, much like the Muggle world, after hours bars were generally frowned upon, and in most cases illegal. But much like the Muggle world, not many places tended to care and kept serving anyways.

Dobby led Dean past the pub's last few stragglers who seemed to have fallen asleep beside their half drunken Butterbeers.

They approached a booth at the end of the room, where a hooded stranger was sitting up straight, and still seemed to be taking swig after swig of his pint without any apparent trouble.

"Hey..." Dean started, tentatively, as they drew closer. "You're the guy who closed Koreander's dimension door a few months back."

Without turning his head, the stranger replied, "That man has no business playing with that kind of magic." The cloaked man placed down his pint and leaned back in his seat. "Why have you come to see me again, house elf?"

Dobby lifted himself into the booth so that he was sitting across from the stranger. "Dobby's friends are in trouble."

"I don't owe your friends a thing."

"What about Dumbledore?"

"What _about_ your former slave master?"

"Remember when he promised to make Hogwarts waste free? He kept his word."

"Yeah? Good for him. For keeping to what we had _already_ agreed upon." He turned his head to Dean. "Why is it that everyone wants a pat on the back for keeping their end of the bargain these days?"

Dobby, who had previously been fidgeting his fingers as the stranger deflected each of his attempts for help, clamped his hands together on the table before him—almost as if he was about to start praying.

"They took Dumbledore," the house elf said quietly.

"What do you mean, they _took_ Dumbledore?"

"Dobby thinks the Ministry arrested him and sent him to Azkaban."

For a moment, the stranger fell silent. He then picked up his pint glass and finished the rest in one giant gulp. "What about Minerva McGonagall?"

Dobby leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes.

The cloaked figure suddenly sat up straight; his fingers gripped around the pint glass so tightly that it appeared as if it might shatter. "They killed Minerva..." he said softly.

Dobby nodded slowly as he continued on, "This is why Hogwarts needs your help. If not for Dobby or former slave master, do it for her. You have the power to stop them. You have the power to help us. You have the power to—"

"No," the cloaked man interrupted. He reached for his hood and pulled it back over his head, shedding some light on his green head of hair. His hands were beginning to shake as he stared coldly back at Dobby, assessing the situation at hand. "... the power is yours."

 **END OF ACT II**


	19. Chapter 19

**The Other World**

Neville Longbottom opened his eyes. For the first time in many weeks, he was no longer being pursued by his burgundy tormentor. He rolled over on the rainforest floor and kissed the earth. The Paozusaurus was somebody else's problem now. Yes, he did feel bad that his friends in the wizarding world were left to deal with the dinosaur but he reasoned that in their turf, it wouldn't stand a chance. Besides, he thought to himself, Harry would probably come up with a way to fight it. After all, he hadn't let them down before.

How long had it been since Neville had fallen through the dimension door? How long had it been since he had last seen his friends and family? Until he saw Cube again, it was starting to feel like he had always lived in this world, that he had grown up eating bugs and grass, that he was always running for his life, unable to defend himself without any magical ability. Unfortunately for poor Neville, his wand snapped within the first five minutes of him being in this land (he tripped over a tree root).

No bother, he thought, gathering himself as he rose to his feet. This world could work for him. At least here, he was his own master and answered to no man. He would have to learn how to survive, he would have to learn how to fight, and he would probably have to learn how to cook, but there was nobody who could tell him what he could and couldn't do. What he could and couldn't be. Neville took one giant step to denote the start of his new life as jungle warlord but immediately tripped over another tree root and face planted into the earth.

He could hear muffled giggles coming from the jungle foliage nearby.

"I'm sorry," a voice to his right said, "I can't keep a straight face anymore. This kid is simply unreal."

"You're going to blow our cover!" said another hushed voice.

"I don't care. I need to meet him for myself."

Neville had already begun to dust himself off when Vegeta emerged from the jungle. The Prince of all Saiyans was wearing his traditional blue, white and gold saiyan armour, laughing proudly as he stood with his hands on his hips. "I wanted to personally thank you," he began as Krillin walked out behind him, "For the most entertaining few weeks I have ever had the pleasure of being a part of."

"What Vegeta means to say," Krillin butted in, "Is are you alright, kid? You took quite the fall just now."

"I'd say the boy looks like he's used to taking a fall."

"You don't need to rub it in."

Vegeta plugged his nose when he became aware of Neville's smell. "Speaking of rubbing it in… when's the last time you took a bath?"

Krillin leaned in and whispered, "Probably not since he got here."

Getting more and more confused with every sentence, Neville held up his hands. "Wait a second… have you both been watching me?"

Vegeta and Krillin looked at each other and replied in silence.

"How _long_ have you been watching me?"

The silence continued before Krillin offered an explanation, "See, the thing is…we had a bit of a pool going for how long you'd survive in the jungle."

"You were betting on me?!"

"I wouldn't exactly say that we were betting _on_ you…"

"You were just going to let me die in the jungle?!"

"Oh, we would've saved you if we thought you were in any real danger."

"Speak for yourself," Vegeta mumbled under his breath. "A _true_ saiyan warrior would have taken his death like a man. Albeit, it probably wouldn't have been so honourable a death... but you would have at least died knowing that you provided a stupendous show for your superiors!"

Neville was turning his head in circles, attempting to find his bearings. "You watch people get hunted for sport? That's sick."

"It beats reality television," Vegeta replied. "And with Kakarot off fighting some ancient space demons, there hasn't been much to keep us entertained lately."

"Well, how would you like it if people watched you get hunted?"

Krillin piped in, "Vegeta actually participated in the last _Hunger Games_. I tried to talk him out of it—you know, on account of him being a million times stronger than the other participants and all—but he really does enjoy being the centre of attention."

Vegeta clenched his fist. "You unromantic bald prick. I simply thought it would be a pleasant way to meet new people. The blue haired one may have broken my heart but you know what they say… when a saiyan's heart is healed it will come back stronger than ever!"

"You didn't have to kill Katniss."

"Fool! Of course I did—she cheated on me with PETA!"

"I don't think that was his name…"

"And when I found out what she had done with that animal loving sack of shit, I whispered into her ear just before I crushed her entire world: 'MAYBE YOU WON'T BE SUCH A DISAPPOINTMENT… IN THE AFTERLIFE'."

Rolling his eyes, Krillin pointed his thumb at Vegeta. "This smart guy used the Final Flash on the stadium. Lucky that Goku wasn't around to see that."

"He will see it soon enough. Because the video's already racking up millions of hits on Youtube. That's right children, the Prince of All Saiyans is well on his way to becoming an Internet Sensation!"

Meanwhile, thirty miles away, in the North-West corner of the very same rainforest that Neville had found himself in, a different kind of confrontation was unfolding. Though Ice Cube no longer had his wand (or his piece, for that matter), he was more than happy to beat the crap out of Cornelius Fudge, who seemed to have sprained his ankle upon stumbling out of the dimension door. The only thing holding him back was Barry Little who wanted Cube to conserve his energy and help them find water and shelter.

Though they had only been in this world for a few minutes, Barry had a feeling that they were going to be stuck there for a while.

"Maybe if I could climb to the top of one of these trees, I could see if there's a village or something around here."

"Trust me, little man. There ain't nothin' but canopy up there. We'll have better luck just pushing through and hoping we don't get eaten alive." He looked down at Fudge, who could only hold his twisted leg in agony as he waited to see what would become of him. "You are right though. We should get a move on."

With his hands on his hips, Cube stepped up onto a boulder and took a quick survey of his surroundings. "I guess we can try that way." He hopped off the boulder and started a path through the bushes, with Barry close behind.

"Wait!" cried Fudge. He attempted to stand up but fell back down as the pain became too much for his weight to bear. He groaned in agony, "Are you really going to just leave me here? You're really going to let an old disabled man die on his own?"

Cube doubled back to Fudge, stood before him for a moment, and then punched him in the face. "Shut the fuck up you ableist cunt." He turned around and continued on his path.

Meanwhile again, in the same North-West corner of the rainforest (though slightly closer to Cube and company—a mere two miles away), the remaining members of the House of Negus tumbled through a separate dimension door.

"Next time, I'm taking the lead," said Mr. Jackson, throwing up as he let go of Hermione's hand, who in turn released the hand of Captain Planet—the cloaked stranger who had led them into this world.

The environmentally conscious superhero pondered aloud, "Something about this place seems awfully familiar…" He floated gracefully while the Negus members caught their breath on the forest floor, exhausted from the long journey that was now behind them.

"First things first." Hermione whispered the spell _designo_ and traced the end of her wand into the dirt. Right on cue, the earth began to part in tiny wedges forming a kind of miniature map of the forest at their feet. "Ah ha!" she exclaimed triumphantly, pointing her wand at two moving dots. "Those are our boys. But we have to get there quick before—whoa!"

A young man wearing thick black glasses and bright red pants was sitting cross-legged on a yellow cloud before her. "Can I help you?" asked Gohan, who had sensed the visitors upon arrival and had hurried over from Master Roshi's island to investigate. His eyes passed over Mr. Jackson, Hermione, Buggin' Out, Dean Thomas, and Dobby before finally settling on the floating figure of Captain Planet. "Holy smokes!" Gohan shouted excitedly. "Are you back to fight us again? Just one sec, let me call my friends. They'll sure be glad to see you!"

Captain Planet waved his arms frantically, "There's really no need for—"

But Gohan had already begun to power up. Buggin' Up stumbled backwards as the earth began to dissolve beneath the floating Nimbus cloud and the trees surrounding them bent inwards. Within seconds, Krillin appeared, followed by Vegeta who had been carrying the terrified Neville by the scruff of his collar.

"You again?" Transforming into a Super Saiyan on the spot, Vegeta let go of Neville, sending the poor Gryffindor flying face first into his former classmate. Vegeta puffed out his chest and let out a hearty laugh. "Have you returned to get your ass beat like the puny weakling you are? Don't you remember what happened last time? And we've only gotten stronger since. Why, I bet even Krillin could destroy you now!"

"Hey!" exclaimed Krillin, who snapped on his blue wrist bands. "That's the nicest thing you've ever said to me, Vegeta."

Captain Planet raised his head, looking longingly towards a sky he couldn't see (because it was blocked out by the rainforest canopy). "I wasn't expecting to see you people again… For what it's worth, the person you once knew… I left that person behind. I'm reformed now."

Vegeta scoffed. "Reformed, my ass. We'll see about that."

Neville stood up and began brushing himself off; it wasn't until his focus began to return to him that he realized who exactly he had bumped into. "... Hermione?" Still recovering from the crash, he spoke through a daze. "Is that really you?"

Rubbing her eyes, Hermione tilted her head, unsure of the identity of the boy who stood before him.

"It's me. Neville Longbottom."

Longbottom. It was a name she had heard at least a lifetime ago, like an echo in a dream, and one that she had long since forgotten. For a moment, she felt a strange sense of déjà vu that brought her back four and a half years to the Hogwarts Express—to a moment when a boy asked her to help him find his lost toad...

"Neville!" she swung her arms around him as the memories came flooding back all at once. "I don't know how to explain it," she sobbed. "But I had forgotten you. I'm so sorry."

"It's okay," he replied in an attempt to console her. "When I came to this place, it happened to me too. I began to forget where I came from… until I saw Ice Cube again."

Hermione broke off the embrace and gripped his shoulders. "You saw Cube? When?"

"Not too long ago… but there was a dinosaur chasing after him so I'm not sure—"

"Oh." Hermione seemed disappointed. "You probably saw him the first time he came through the door then."

"The reunion can wait," started Mr. Jackson. "As it stands, we wasted enough time as it is getting here. For all we know, our friends could be dead already."

"They certainly aren't dead," said Vegeta. "Despite their insignificant power levels, I've been able to sense them from the moment they arrived."

"He's right," Krillin said, nodding his head. "I can feel them too."

Mr. Jackson took a step towards Vegeta, at first cautiously, but then found his confidence. "Tell us where they are."

"No ' _please'_? Oh, I like this human," Vegeta said, slightly amused. "Before I tell you where your friends are digging around, I—"

"They're a mile over in that direction," Gohan interrupted.

"Dammit, son of Kakarot! If it weren't for the fact that I'd be wiping out a significant percentage of my own race, I would surely be sending you to another life!"

Krillin muttered, "And don't call him Shirley."

"Don't make me kill you again, bald one!"

"You need to listen to the young wizards." Captain Planet broke his levitation and began drifting back down to Earth. He touched down in front of Buggin' Out (who still hadn't managed to regain his footing and lay in the dirt). "The Earth as we know it is being corrupted by an evil that found its origins in humanity. It's the same evil that tears down trees and pollutes our waters with the stains that tear our sky apart. It's the same—are you kidding me?"

Vegeta had unwrapped a candy bar and was letting the wrapper hang off the edge of his fingertip. "Oh, was I supposed to throw this in the trash? Too bad I'm not a pussy." He let the wrapper hit the ground.

Captain Planet winced as the suffering of the world surged through him. "One day, Vegeta. One day Mother Nature will get her revenge and I won't be around to protect you—Oh, for the love of Pete."

Vegeta had torn several roots out of the ground and was in the process of rolling the leaves into a thick, bushy blunt. "Am I interrupting you? Just pretend I'm not here." He shot a small energy beam out of his hand to light the end. "Patience is a virtue," he continued, passing the blunt to the (extremely) eager arms of Dobby. Dean Thomas' eyes widened as he shot the house elf a this-is-not-the-best-time-for-that look. Vegeta exhaled. "You'll get a puff soon enough," he finished.

"I don't want a…" Captain Planet coughed through the smoke ring that Vegeta blew his way. "... a puff. I want you to understand why I'm here."

Vegeta landed in front of Captain Planet, standing directly in front of him, face to face.

"And why _are_ you here?"

Barry and Cube had hit something of a road block. In the clearing ahead of their path through the rainforest, lay a dinosaur that was nearly three times the size of the one Cube had brought back with him to the wizarding world.

"Is that the brother?" asked Barry.

"I think it's the mother," Cube replied.

They were hiding several metres away in the bushes, watching the dinosaur sleep on its backside—its belly rising and falling as it snored, fast asleep. "Come with me, I have a plan." The pair turned around and started to head back in the direction they came from.

Twenty minutes later, they returned with the Minister of Magic limping in front of them.

"I'm pleased you imbeciles finally decided to come to your senses," Fudge declared with his nose in the air. "When we return, I'll be sure to have your Azkaban sentences reduced to only five years each. Now how does that sound—"

They reached the edge of the clearing and Fudge finally became aware of the sleeping dinosaur. Beginning to panic, he spun around, "Please, I didn't mean… I know there's another way… how about one year in Azkaban each?"

Cube pushed Fudge forward just as the dinosaur snapped one eye open. "I suggest you start running."

The minister bolted off through the forest as the dinosaur roared to life—shaking the earth as it sauntered after him.

"I'll give you ten to one odds on that one."

"No way, Vegeta! Did you see him? He's a total goner. I'd say three to one odds at most."

"Don't you dare underestimate the disabled!"

Vegeta and Krillin swooped down from the air and picked up the frozen-in-spot targets of Cube and Barry.

"Sorry about the abrupt introduction," Krillin said to them. "But your friends kind of want to see you."

"Well, well. This is something I never thought I'd see again. The gang's all here." Master Roshi hobbled over to the edge of his island as Vegeta and Krillin landed with the pair of Negus students.

"Mr. Jackson?" Barry rushed over to his old teacher and wrapped his arms around him. Mr. Jackson patted him on the back, nodding over at Cube who seemed entranced by the slow-talking tortoise.

"Oh, don't mind, Turtle," Master Roshi explained. "He's just excited to see so many new… and familiar faces." He stepped toward the Saiyan Prince. "It's been a long time, Vegeta."

"Yes it has, old man."

"How come you never visit me anymore?"

"Because you live out in the middle of nowhere. You don't even have the Internet."

Master Roshi adjusted his glasses.

"He still thinks he can get stronger than Goku if he spends all of his spare time training." Piccolo was leaning against the railing of the beach house (which stood in the island's centre and occupied about 80% of its total size). "Some things never change."

"Shut your filthy green face, Namek," Vegeta spat back. "And didn't you _die_ in our last battle?"

"If you had friends yourself, maybe you'd know what it feels like to have someone who can wish you back to life with the Dragon Balls."

Vegeta turned around. "Which one of you animal loving sacks of shit wished this fool back to life?"

Gohan looked down at his shoes. Cell and Frieza briefly looked up from their game of chess, but continued on. Goten, who had earlier been joined by Buggin' Out in a multiplayer _Smash Bros._ match with the TV they had set up on the beach, simply ignored Vegeta's question. Finally, King Kai stepped forward, hanging his head in shame. "I couldn't help it… he had this really great chicken curry recipe that I forgot to write down before he died."

Captain Planet raised his hand. "Can we please try to focus on—"

"Is the little blue baby going to start crying about global warming again?" Vegeta mocked heartily. "Do you want some melted icebergs to chill out your tosey woseys?"

"Global warming's a serious threat and if we don't take it seriously—"

"It's because of people like you," Vegeta cut in again, "That Leonardo Dicaprio had to die in _Titanic_. If that iceberg had been melted, _as nature intended it to_ , that ship never would have sunk and Jack never would have ended up on that beach at the beginning of _Inception_."

Captain Planet twitched, unable to reply.

Barry tugged at Hermione's wizard sleeve, motioning for a hug.

"Hey, little guy," said Hermione, bending down to his level. "We missed you. We… weren't sure you were still alright."

"Cube kept me safe." Cube nodded with an appreciative grin. "Where's Cho?"

Hermione shrugged. "She wanted to come, but I told her to stay and rest up. I wasn't convinced she was fully recovered yet. The way she would walk around the common room… she didn't exactly have a limp… but ever since that Quidditch game, I dunno. She still seemed slower to me."

"Well, hopefully she feels better by the time you get back."

"Mmhmm. Oh! Here's something else. I talked to my parents about it and they're gonna let Cho move in with us for the summer!"

"That's awesome." Barry looked down at the white sand, somewhat uneasily. "But… what about Cho's parents?"

Hermione sighed. "I guess you wouldn't have heard about it but… they told her not to come home."

"That's kind of fucked up!" Barry clamped his hand over his mouth. "... sorry for swearing."

Hermione hugged the young wizard all over again. "Oh, it's alright." She reflected on something in her head for a moment but continued shortly after, "Maybe things will be different after we get back."

" _If_ we get back," Captain Planet corrected. He was beginning to lose his patience at the lack of interest the Z-Fighters seemed to be showing at his presence. "But there's no sense in going back unless _everybody_ is going back."

Piccolo suddenly looked concerned. "Are you telling me you need _our_ help to save your new world even though the last time you were here, you tried to destroy ours?"

"Of course he needs our help," said Vegeta. "You expect him to be able to clean up his own problems? He couldn't even clean up his own planet."

"Even for you," Captain Planet replied, "That's a low-blow, Vegeta. And just because—"

His eyes nearly popped out of their sockets when Vegeta removed the chest plate of his Saiyan armour, revealing a bright red T-shirt with an oval globe in the centre.

"WHERE DID YOU GET THAT SHIRT?" Captain Planet practically screamed the question.

Vegeta smirked. "Oh, this old thing?"

"THAT SHIRT IS THE PROPERTY OF THE PLANETEERS! NOW, TELL ME EXACTLY WHERE YOU GOT IT!"

Vegeta raised an eyebrow. "It appears... that you already know exactly where I got it from."

In a burst of fury, Captain Planet charged forward at Vegeta but was immediately held back by Goten.

"Are you even trying anymore?" scoffed Vegeta, nodding at the young Saiyan child who was holding the Captain back with just a single finger. "What you fail to comprehend is that while you were laying back and getting that ocean tan of yours, we've been getting stronger."

Captain Planet relented—he stopped struggling forward and Goten released his grip. Collapsing onto the island's sand, he whispered, "Fine Vegeta." With a flick of his wrist, a dimension door spun to life near the edge of the beach. "And it's not just my world that needs saving. So don't come crying to me when yours is destroyed too."

He began levitating off the ground and floated toward the door.

"You aren't strong enough to defeat the new power anyways."

"What new power?"

But Captain Planet had already passed through the dimension door, triggering the expected slowdown of the door's rotation—it was starting to close.

Vegeta turned to Mr. Jackson and asked again. "What new power?"

Mr. Jackson was watching the closing portal nervously. None of the other members of Team Negus knew how to open another dimension door—and Hermione only had a little experience when it came to closing them.

"When Voldemort disappeared, the American government stepped in to take over the wizarding world. President Obama is the new Headmaster at Hogwarts. And before we left, they had already announced plans to invade universes like yours using their new dimension door technology."

Vegeta scratched his chin. "So Obama's the president in your universe… interesting."

Mr. Jackson's voice couldn't hide his growing panic. "Listen, I don't really give a damn whether you help us or not but we have to leave. NOW."

Vegeta glanced over at Master Roshi who dropped his cane to the ground and began to meditate.

Barry pulled on Hermione's wizard sleeve. "Obama made himself Headmaster at Hogwarts after we left? How did that happen so quickly?"

Cube jumped in. "I was just about to say—how the hell did all this happen in the ten minutes we were gone?"

Hermione seemed genuinely confused. "Ten minutes? I'm not quite sure I…" She trailed off as something dawned on her.

Oblivious to Hermione's revelation, Mr. Jackson finished for her, "It didn't happen right after ya'll left. Maybe a few months later when we finally met Captain—"

"Hold up!" Cube shouted. "A few months? You're fucking with me right?"

"No… why would I be?"

Cube turned to Hermione. "Can you please explain to us what's going on?"

Hermione replied softly. "How long were you in this world before you found us?"

"I dunno… maybe an hour or two?"

Hermione fell silent.

Mr. Jackson, who had just put two and two together, whispered solemnly, "Jesus. How is that even possible? You were gone for an entire year… Hermione, how is that possible?"

The former Gryffindor looked out at the ocean and watched its waves crash and break just a few feet away from her. "We've been in this world for almost a day," she said, more to herself than the other Negus members around her. She looked ahead at the dimension door that had nearly stopped spinning as her face lost its colour. "Cho…" she said softly, as her eyes welled up. "Cho..." she said again.

Without warning, she broke away from her friends, knocking Barry off his feet in the process, and ran across the island. Hermione ignored the calls of Mr. Jackson as she dove through the dimension door, unwilling to accept what she knew she was about to find on the other side.


	20. Chapter 20

**Nineteen Years Later**

"So _this_ is how the other half lives," said Vegeta as he admired the ancient architecture of the wizarding castle. In the end, the Saiyan Prince had taken pity on the band of wizards and had decided to accompany them on their journey home. The other Z-Fighters were much more reluctant about leaving their homeland behind; though they were still considering the merits of this potential adventure, they were unfortunately a bit too slow in their decision-making and the dimension door swirled shut, cutting them off from following through.

"It used to look much better than this," replied Mr. Jackson.

Hogwarts was wasting away. Though the castle still carried a certain amount of magnificence from afar, it was clear that a lack of upkeep, as well as some unknown catastrophe, had led to its deterioration. The grass outside seemed to have been burnt into a yellow flatbed while its walls were on the verge of crumbling apart. Most noticeably, a piece of the Headmaster's Tower had been blown away, leaving a sizable open gap in the rooftop.

Mr. Jackson squinted. A small figure seemed to emerge from the hole in the roof and shoot off into the clouds above. He adjusted his glasses and turned to Vegeta. "Was that..."

With his eyes still glued to the Headmaster tower (as he had immediately been able to sense Captain Planet even before he flew out), Vegeta nodded his head. And after a few moments of internal consideration, he began to rise up into the air himself.

"Hey, wait a sec!" Mr. Jackson called after him. "You aren't really going to leave us here, are you?"

"I have a quick question for our baby-blue friend." He began to ascend, but paused in mid-air when he thought of something. He looked down at Mr. Jackson. "If you want my advice, you'll take your boys as far away from this place as you can. I'm not so sure that I'm the strongest fighter here." And with that, he was wrapped in a cocoon of wind—a burst of energy that shook the ground beneath him as he shot off into the clouds, and disappeared.

The Negus members made their way inside and straight to the entrance of the Great Hall—the doorway of which nearly broke off its hinges as Mr. Jackson pushed them open. The grand ceiling, normally a canvas for the Milky Way or a deep blue sky (depending on what magic Dumbledore chose to fill it with for the day) was now merely a sharp black.

The hall was virtually empty, save for a few house elves that were aimlessly sweeping dirt in circles around the long abandoned house tables.

Barry walked carefully into the centre of the Hall, his jaw dropped at the horrific decay that screamed out at him from every corner of the room. Mr. Jackson motioned for the others, who were just as shell shocked at the castle's transformation, to huddle in near him.

"Listen up, Negus," he started. "We don't know yet if this place was completely abandoned but I'm willing to bet that someone's bound to have stuck around. First things first, we need to find Hermione. If there really is such a time gap between the two worlds, she'll have been here for at least a couple days already. Cube?"

"I'll check the common room."

"Fine. I think a group of us should head out to Hagrid's cabin before we see what's up in Dumbledore's old office. Everyone else should bunker down until we figure this shit out. Dobby? Can you lead everyone to the kitchen?"

Dobby nodded solemnly—his eyes were glued to the unfortunate sight of the house elves pushing dirt around the room. "Dobby's friends are all gone," he whispered.

"Alright, I think that's everything. Let's try to be quick and meet in…" Mr. Jackson trailed off when he noticed Barry had slouched into the floor, his head lowered between his knees. "Hey, little man," he called out. "We need your help for this too."

Barry lifted his head, wiping his sleeve across his face. "Mr. Jackson... I think I need to go home."

"I know you do but we can't leave just yet—"

"But my mom!" Barry screamed out. "My mom was already _old_! And if that was twenty years ago..." Barry attempted to stand up but his legs began to wobble—he felt sick, as if he had woken up from a dream for the very first time and all the positive things that had ever happened to him were really just in his head all along. Nineteen years may have passed but he was still only eleven years old (twelve in July). He didn't _feel_ twelve though. The weight of his surroundings had aged him to the point where he began to understand what had happened to Harry Potter, and why he was unable to cope with the pressure and isolation that came with being called "the chosen one".

Barry reached behind his back to scratch his arm but remembered it was no longer there. He could feel it sometimes, his missing arm. It was a sensation he didn't quite know how to describe, nor could he find anyone who could relate to its absence, but he could feel it alright, perhaps even more so than when it was there.

After Barry's breakdown, the reality of the situation hit the rest of the Negus members. They stood in silence for a few moments, each of them considering the personal ramifications of being missing in time for two decades. Cube was the first to break away from the group, cursing to himself as he punched his fist against the Great Hall door, nearly forcing it off its last remaining hinge.

 _This is bullshit_ , Cube thought to himself as he exited Hogwarts and began the familiar path around the castle and into the underground which led to the Negus common room. Even though he still had the castle's lantern light that helped to heat up the Hogwarts' experience, Cube's arrival in their old pad felt somewhat… chillier. He stepped into the centre of the common room and glanced down at the forgotten fireplace—now a thick bed of spiderwebs.

He called out, mostly out of habit, to announce his presence. Though he was intent on finding somebody, anybody, who could explain what had happened here, part of him hoped that nobody would reply. Deep down, he didn't really want to know.

After a few minutes of silence, he turned his back to leave but stopped when he heard a soft pair of footsteps coming down the stairs of the girls' dormitory. A girl with frizzy brown hair looked down at him as she descended the staircase. There were cuts across Hermione's face and a large gash in her neck that seemed to have gotten infected. Cube rushed over to her as she collapsed to her knees. She was holding a broomstick with the engraved word: _Ravenclaw_.

In the Hogwarts kitchen, Dobby couldn't believe his eyes. Though the rest of the school seemed on the verge of breaking apart and fading away, the kitchen was as sleek and clean as it had ever been. In fact, the number of house elves seemed to have doubled since their last visit—creating an effective assembly line of goods… that seemingly went nowhere.

Dobby approached one of the house elves whose sole purpose seemed to be drying dishes. He waved his hand in front of the worker expecting him to at least wince, but received not even the slightest reaction. Dobby looked up at Dean Thomas who had noticed the exact same thing. Though these house elves were definitely alive (and even whispering occasionally), there was something oddly mechanical about their movements. Neville Longbottom, whose only intact memory of Hogwarts was now this kitchen, solemnly stepped into the centre of the room and turned back to face Dean and Dobby.

"The house elves aren't in control of themselves."

"How do you know that?"

"I've seen it before."

Though he had initially given everyone instructions to avoid the Headmaster's Tower _until_ they had regrouped, Mr. Jackson was being led there anyways—after Barry dashed out of the Great Hall, forcing Mr. Jackson to chase after him.

He called after the boy. He knew this was hard on him—coming to terms with the change in time. He remembered telling him something similar when they had first landed in England. What was it about? The flight? No. The baggage? That wasn't right either. Ah, the jet lag. You might be jet lagged for a couple of days, he had told him. But sooner or later, you'll get used to the shift.

He called after Barry one last time as Dumbledore's old Gargoyle jumped aside, allowing student and teacher to bound the steps together, not quite ready for the man who had taken up occupancy in the office.


	21. Chapter 21

**The Ballad of Mr. Rogers**

"We never meant for things to get this bad," said former-President Obama, now Headmaster of Hogwarts, as Barry and Mr. Jackson both cautiously stepped into the once eccentric looking office. Obama looked up at them wearily, not particularly surprised by their sudden appearance. "All I ever wanted was change… and when I found out that the top position at Hogwarts was available, I didn't really think about _why_ it was available. I just went for it. I thought that if I could be at the centre of this magical revolution, I'd have more than enough to bring back to America with me… to solve the country's water crisis in ways I didn't previously think were possible. Only… I never in a million years would have guessed just how many enemies Hogwarts has. Or that I would be the one responsible if we couldn't stop them..." Obama paused and wiped his thumb across a dusty picture frame on his desk—revealing the faded face of Joe Biden. "At the time, I just thought… that _yes_ , we could."

Barry shivered—a cool breeze was travelling in and out of the giant hole in the roof, leading a light snowfall into the office. Besides the fact that the office looked as if it had been ripped apart by a tornado, Barry couldn't take his eyes away from the wheezing phoenix in the corner of the space.

Fawkes, the previously vibrant phoenix who once lit up Dumbledore's office, had lost most of his feathers and colour—shifting into a brownish grey as it hung its head between his shoulders.

"I've been told that it won't come back again," said Obama, who noticed Barry's gaze. "It's rebirthing days are long gone." He turned to Mr. Jackson. "And when the world looks as bad as this… why _would_ you want to come back to it?"

Mr. Jackson stepped forward, crunching parchment and rooftop debris, as he approached the Headmaster's desk. "What happened here?" he asked.

"What happened here," Obama repeated, pulling open one of the desk drawers and withdrawing an old wand. "Is that I lost everything." He looked once more at the portrait of his vice president on his desk. He pointed the wand at his own temple. "Everything."

Before Mr. Jackson had a chance to protest, a flash of green light filled the room, pouring a trail through the opened ceiling, and turning the softly falling snowflakes into emerald dust.

Beneath Hogwarts was a kitchen filled with house elves—a space where Dean and Dobby were attempting to rally its occupants for information. Beneath the kitchen full of house elves was the Negus common room—a space where Cube and Hermione were attempting to come to grips with their lost time. Beneath the Negus common room, there stood a space that did not exist two decades prior. Once upon a time, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was said to be the safest place in the world. After Dumbledore disappeared and the general well-being of wizards everywhere went up in flux, the second safest place in the world, Gringotts Wizarding Bank, had an idea. The bank, already well-known for its expansive dungeons and extreme forms of security, decided to take advantage of this dire situation and tried to sell its security systems as part of its brand. Hogwarts, who had already lost plenty of students from the Quidditch incident, was one of the first places to bite and invested in its own dungeons beneath the school.

For a time, this purchase seemed to be in the best interest of the school… until Professor Severus Snape went berserk, that is.

After news spread throughout the wizarding world that Harry Potter had committed suicide, depression rates skyrocketed. Children who had formerly idolized the chosen one either dropped out of school and joined the Death Eaters, or decided to follow in his footsteps and bind the Kamikaze curse to themselves. The membership rate of the Order of the Phoenix dropped to nearly a quarter of its former size, while the population of Hogwarts itself continued to dwindle.

The news hit Professor Snape especially hard. In fact, for years afterwards, he refused to believe it. It wasn't until he was able to track down one of the Ministry officers who had been there, extract some teardrops for the Pensieve, and saw the memory for himself, that he finally accepted what had happened. Some say that was the day that Snape truly lost his mind. Nobody really knows what happened but said officer was eventually found at a later date, missing both of his arms.

Snape's response to Harry's death, to Obama's takeover, was to declare war on Hogwarts. Using the newly built Gringott-branded dungeons below the castle, he had been able to foster his army. He wasn't playing a game of force. He was playing a game of slow psychological warfare—one that spanned nearly two decades. He didn't plan on utterly destroying the wizarding world through sudden violence; he was counting on time itself to help him emerge the victor. With his new team, they had set a pace of destruction that so far, seemed to be working.

Eventually, and he anticipated that it would, word got out that Snape had been behind the calculated murders of top politicians and prominent figures in the wizarding community. Sending an army to destroy Hogwarts was the Ministry of Magic's response. Little did they know of the dungeons that Snape had invested, and was now living in. When the bombs dropped, Snape was reading in bed and could hear his ceiling begin to shake. He chuckled to himself and turned the page.

Twenty four hours later, he emerged from the underground to survey the damage. Ninety five percent of Hogwarts' occupants had been killed by the Ministry—the only survivors being the house elves, who were already mostly underground, and a group that were luckily outside of the castle, seeking refuge near the Forbidden Forest. Snape saw all of this, yawned, and went back to bed.

One of the aforementioned survivors, and witness to nearly everything since Harry passed, could only watch on helplessly as the castle began to crumble. As the debris blasted forth from Hogwarts, sending bits and pieces flying toward Hagrid's cabin, Mr. Rogers felt a small sphere bounce across his toe. He crouched down to pick up the four-star Dragon Ball and held it up, allowing the warm, orange aura, to glow across his face. He wasn't sure what this was but he knew he should keep it and figure out what it meant.

It took him five years, but he finally figured out the Dragon Ball's purpose, that there were seven of them, and that when they were all brought together, he could make a single wish to an eternal dragon. It took him another five years to find the remaining six.

Mr. Rogers had backpacked across worlds, journeyed between dimensions, and had done things that weren't exactly considered to be "neighbourly" but nevertheless he stood at the doorstep of Hagrid's cabin, in present day, and ready to summon the dragon.

He had barely knocked before the cabin door swung open and Hagrid yanked him indoors.

"Are ya nuts?" whispered Hagrid. "Standin' out there like that. Waitin' for somethin' bad to happen. Tryin' to get me killed!"

Mr. Rogers replied politely, "I don't know the reason, but if Snape wanted you dead, it would've happened by now. Perhaps, there's still more for you to do, before you go."

Hagrid was pacing in front of his simmering fireplace. "Whodoya think ya are? Barging into my place all wise-words like some kinda…" He broke off and cracked a smile. "Oh, who am I kiddin'?" He embraced Mr. Rogers, lifting him off the ground as he held his friend close. The pair hadn't seen each other in ten years.

When Hagrid had finally released Mr. Rogers, lowering him down to the cabin floor, Mr. Rogers caught his (squeezed out) breath. "I missed you too, old friend."

"Did you find them?" Hagrid asked anxiously as Mr. Rogers set down his backpack on the kitchen table.

Mr. Rogers nodded and Hagrid exhaled a sigh of relief. The half-giant slumped into the couch before his fireplace, wiping a sleeve across his face as tears began running down his cheek. "Thank you, Fred." He looked up at the moving portrait above the mantle—an old photograph of three of his favourite students, now waving back at him—and sobbed. "Thank you."

Mr. Rogers rushed over to the couch to comfort his friend.

Hagrid cried, "I just… I just didn't think that things would ever be alright again… ya know?"

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door.

Mr. Rogers patted Hagrid's knee. "I'll get it," he said, rising to his feet. He stepped over to the door and pulled it open.

Standing before him was a round-faced, almost clumsy looking boy wearing tattered Gryffindor robes.

They stared at each other in silence, both of them trying to place how they knew the other.

Finally, Mr. Rogers had an 'aha' moment and a warm smile stretched across his face. "Who are you?" he asked, straightening his tie, and preparing himself for what was to come next.

Having been hit with the same level of enlightenment, Neville stepped forward until he was face to face with his greeter. "I'm—"

"Neville Longbottom."

Neville blinked just as Mr. Rogers vanished.

"Oi Neville!" shouted Hagrid from inside the cabin. "Whatareya doin' with the front door open? We need to figure out what to do with them Dragon Balls. I can't do this without ya!"

Neville paused—taking a quick glance over his shoulder before using both arms to hoist himself through the cabin's front door. He stood with his hands on his hips, staring straight at the backpack with the Dragon Balls. For the first time in many years, he didn't feel like the twerp who got picked on by Slytherin bullies or the chump who was made fun of by his Gryffindor peers whenever one of his spells went wrong. For the first time, he felt as if he was no longer a prop in the background, playing second fiddle to a shadow that stretched out and into the horizon. He felt as if he had found his place in the world, that he mattered, that he wasn't just a throwaway, that his decisions could affect people, and that he was actually needed.

He felt special.


	22. Chapter 22

**The Final Dimension Door**

" _WHY HAVE YOU SUMMONED ME_?" Shenron, the Eternal Dragon, was so large that it was nearly twice the height of Hogwarts' castle. Meanwhile, its tail was so long that it was almost able to fill up the entirety of the Forbidden Forest.

In awe of the scales that seemed to stretch from the ground and all the way up into the clouds, Neville stumbled backward, directly into Hagrid.

"Well, that's a mighty good lookin' beast, now ain't it?" declared the half-giant, admiring the great dragon from below. "Where do you reckon it goes when the Dragon Balls aren't together?"

Neville shrugged. "Under water? I don't know where else it could fit."

" _I DO NOT HAVE ALL DAY_ ," boomed the dragon, clearly growing impatient with Neville's hesitation.

Almost involuntarily, Neville bounced forward and bowed his head.

" _WHY ARE YOU BOWING_?" the dragon asked, its eyes sharpening to a darker shade of red.

Without fully raising his head, Neville replied, "Umm… I just thought that it was culturally relevant to this situation—"

" _BECAUSE I'M A DRAGON, YOU AUTOMATICALLY ASSOCIATE ME WITH ASIAN CULTURE? I'LL HAVE YOU KNOW I GREW UP IN THE BRONX_."

Neville snapped up straight. "Wow, really?"

" _OF COURSE NOT, YOU FOOL. NOW TELL ME WHAT YOU WISH FOR_."

Unbeknownst to Neville, Hagrid, and even Shenron himself, the giant doors of Hogwarts castle had just opened up making way for Buggin' Out, who sprinted down the field toward the cabin.

"Hey!" he shouted at Neville. "You know what I just realized would be pretty jammin'? If every brotha had his own dimension door, we could travel through time and space instead of public transport. What's that, baby? Two am booty call? Just let me hop through this dimension door and BAM, betcha didn't see me comin'. Now _that's_ something I can back!" He slowed down when he finally noticed the fifty foot dragon floating above their heads. "Da fuck?"

" _IT SHALL BE DONE_." Shenron's eyes began to glow.

Panicked, Neville jumped up to get the dragon's attention. "Wait! No! That wasn't the wish!" He waved his arms frantically as the circle of Dragon Balls floated off the ground, shot straight up into the sky, and were launched in seven separate directions.

The Eternal Dragon winked as its body was embedded in a pool of warm light, tightening into a cocoon of fire that was growing increasingly brighter, until finally, it fizzled into thin air with a simple _pop_. The dragon had vanished.

Buggin' Out, who wasn't quite sure if he had imagined what had just transpired above the Hogwarts grounds, decided not to dwell on it and finished his earlier thought instead. "As I was saying, before I was so _rudely_ interrupted, wouldn't it be great if—oof!"

Neville tackled Buggin' Out to the ground. "You idiot!" he shouted, swinging a fist at the startled and still very confused Negus member. "That was our only chance! Our only—"

With extremely minimal effort, Hagrid hoisted Neville off Buggin' Out by grabbing the cuff of his collar. "Ya might wanna save that for later." He set Neville down on the grass and pointed toward the castle.

The wish was coming true.

Tiny orbs of purple light, initially just flashes for the naked eye, quickly spun into suspended life, leaving their singularities behind as they grew into the large ovals known as dimension doors.

"Those are one way though, right?" asked Buggin' Out nervously, dusting himself off as he rose to his feet. "I mean… nothing could come through from the other side… could it?"

Severus Snape was fuming. Though he had heard murmurs of the Eternal Dragon in his post-Hogwarts travels, he never could have imagined there being much truth to its existence, let alone its promise of a single wish. And yet, it was here ( _was_ being the key word). The most straightforward answer to his question of how to defeat the wizarding community once and for all had slipped through his fingers. Don't get him wrong, he was winning his self-declared 'him vs. everyone' war. And handily.

But Snape was also getting old.

Though his mind was as sharp as ever, his bones were beginning to be left behind. His knees begged for peace. His wrists were suffering. His engines had been running for so long that he was losing steam. And what did he have left to prove anyways? Everyone he had ever loved had long since passed—and everyone he had ever hated had long since met their fate at his wand.

He just wanted it all to end. Snape had done everything he had set out to do, but it had been so long that even he was having trouble pinpointing what exactly that was. He was meandering—picking apart a wizarding community that was two generations separated from him meant that he felt no particular connection to his actions. He didn't exactly regret this current chapter of his life but he could sense its close was forthcoming, as if its great pages were stretching above his head and into the heavens, hesitating for a moment before they were destined to crash down and break—drowning him in the world he helped create.

Suddenly, he heard a faint whisper in the wind, " _Severus_ …"

It was more an echo than a voice, but one that he recognized immediately—even after all these years. He withdrew his Deluminator and flipped the lid: a soft flame flickered out, before quietly rolling into a ball of light. It waited for a moment before it hopped down from the device and ran across the Hogwarts grass. It headed toward the Astronomy Tower as Snape hurried closely behind.

When the orb reached the bottom of the tower's staircase, it hopped twice into the air before disintegrating completely. Snape stuffed the Deluminator back into his pocket and craned his neck. Something was happening on the rooftop.

Taking the winding staircase steps two at a time until he finally reached the top, he mentally prepared himself for what awaited him beyond the rooftop's door. Pushing the previous two decades out of his mind, he relaxed his shoulders and readied his wand—cradling it in both his palms while he waited for a sign.

He closed his eyes briefly and pushed the door open.

In the centre of the rooftop, a dimension door floated just a few inches above the ground. A few feet away from that, standing right along the ledge of the rooftop, stood a majestic black-maned beast. This lion, known to many in the animal kingdom as Scar, growled into the wind and turned his head to greet the new guests. "We've been expecting you. But first, allow me to take care of some… unfinished business."

From their vantage point, Snape was unable to see the dangling Professor Dumbledore, who was clinging with just his fingers, to the ledge of the rooftop. Dumbledore glanced toward the ground, many stories below him, and then back up to the lion who grinned down at him. "Please…" the aging wizard begged.

Scar pounced forward, clawing into Dumbledore's flesh. "Long live... the king!" And with that, Scar flung his paws upward, releasing Dumbledore's grip from the ledge and thrusting the Hogwarts Headmaster toward his vertical grave.

Suddenly, Snape leapt forward with his wand. Scar didn't flinch.

"Where's Dumbledore?" Snape asked steadily.

Scar shrugged his shoulders. "Who?"

"You know who!" Snape straightened out his wand.

The lion raised an eyebrow. "You know who? Oh, you mean, Lord Voldemort."

"No, not you know _who_ , you _know_ who!"

Scar yawned. This scene seemed to be boring him. "Oh yes. I do believe he passed through here but… how do I put this? He was feeling a bit… down."

Without missing a beat, Snape raised his wand just as Scar made a leap through the air. Before the Potions Professor could utter the words he had become so accustomed to saying in the latter half of his life, a large object came barrelling through the dimension door, and accidentally crashed into Scar in mid-lunge. The lion was subsequently bounced off the roof of the tower, roaring as he began his descent toward death, "Don't trust the monkeeeeeeey!"

"I'd like to thank each and every one of you for flying with Air Genie, I hope you have a pleasant evening and we look forward to flying with you again." The magic carpet came to a mid-air halt allowing both Aladdin and Genie to dismount. Abu, the schizophrenic monkey that usually resided on Aladdin's shoulder, had somehow managed to get his head stuck in own his boot when he tumbled into the wizarding world.

Genie stepped over cautiously to the ledge to witness the scene below. Shaking his head when he spotted the twitching body of Scar, he exclaimed, "Daaaamn. He's not gonna be in _Rush Hour 3_!"

Aladdin crouched down to help Abu straighten himself out. "What do you think he meant when he said, don't trust the monkey?"

Abu looked at him irritatedly and hopped up and down.

Genie surveyed the Hogwarts grounds that stretched out to the Forbidden Forest, and then turned back to him. "I dunno Al, but if you ask me—holy fucking shit!"

The crazed, samurai sword wielding baboon known as Rafiki, soared out of the dimension door. Without pause, Rafiki swiped his blade, slicing Aladdin's head off, clean from his shoulders.

"Shiiiiiiit. I'm out." The Genie turned himself into a rocket ship and blasted off of the rooftop. Unfortunately, he forgot about the stranded shoulder monkey, Abu, who was now screeching and leaping about in pure terror after just witnessing the massacre of his former master.

"It is alright, brother," Rafiki said calmly as he put his blade down. "I will not be removing your head." Abu looked frantically at the severed head of Aladdin, the eyes of whom were still open. "However, I am in need of a body for a new voodoo doll I have been crafting."

With a lightning fast swipe, Rafiki caught the young monkey around his neck and hoisted him into the air. Without wasting time, the baboon shoved his fist down Abu's throat and pulled until a series of intestines were ripped from his belly. Dropping Abu's insides to the floor, Rafiki then dug into his pockets and withdrew some cotton. He began forcing the cotton down the now lifeless monkey's throat.

It started out softly, but the new rain began to pour down in waves, drenching the blood soaked shoulders of the baboon who stood tall on the rooftop of the Astronomy Tower. As lightning began to strike across the Hogwart's grounds, Snape decided it was best time to take advantage of his good fortune and quietly abandoned the scene.

Rafiki stepped toward the ledge. With the now taxidermied monkey fastened and dangling from his belt, he knelt down to pick up the head of Aladdin. Roaring into the night, he held it above his head as another lightning bolt shot across the sky.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Hogwart's grounds, Ice Cube, who had just arrived at the entrance of Hagrid's cabin with Hermione, was attempting to watch the happenings on the tower. "I wonder what the fuck is going on up there?" he mused.

Though dimension doors seemed to be opening up across Hogwarts at an alarming rate, Cube happened to notice a separate phenomenon that was taking place. The doors that opened up too closely together were merging into each other—and it wasn't long at all before two doors became four, and four became sixteen. Eventually, the door became large enough that it was able to suck in doors from across the grounds, before they were even fully formed. This black hole of a dimension door, now about the width of Hagrid's cabin, was floating directly above the Astronomy Tower.

Hermione, who hadn't spoken much to Cube since meeting him again in the Negus common room, was staring blankly past the castle, at the Dark Mark symbol that was now floating high in the sky above the old Quidditch pitch. She rubbed her hand on her burning neck wound, now covered tightly with Cube's bandana. "The Death Eaters have come," she said softly.

Hagrid was sitting back on his porch, watching the madness from afar; he took a long and deep drag of his spliff and stood up slowly.

"Cube," he started. "Hold this for me."

For the first time in his life, Hagrid felt like he had the power to make a difference. No longer was he going to be relegated to the slightly anachronistic role of Hogwarts Gamekeeper, especially when his friends were in trouble. He may have been expelled in his youth, but he was still a wizard Goddamnit, and although he didn't have the superficial piece of paper that said so, he could still feel the magical blood flowing through his veins.

As Cube, currently embedded in a haze of smoke, pondered what his next move should be, Hagrid leapt off the porch. The half-giant was seeing red—some flame had been lit within him, one that he hadn't felt since he had first been asked to join the Hogwarts staff, so many years ago. Sitting in his cabin near the woods, Hagrid had been wasting not only his potential, but perhaps his final chance at redemption.

But no more. He was running towards the Hogwarts castle now, seemingly in slow motion, while broomsticks whizzed by overhead. The sky seemed to be changing, twisting into various shades of blackness as the ever-expanding dimension door seemed to warp the space around it.

" _Accio Bonneville_!" Hagrid called out as the 1959 motorcycle soared across the grounds towards him. As if part of some choreographed ballet, Hagrid leaped up and landed on the driver's seat just as the motorcycle passed under him. He was flying now, driving his loyal steed towards certain oblivion. What would he do once he reached the final dimension door? Would he become one with this vacuum of wizarding space? Or would he perhaps cause an unbalance in the other dimension, causing the door to collapse on itself? As he drew closer to the eye of the dimensional storm, the colours in his peripherals began to bleed together. Was he going colour blind? No—what he was experiencing wasn't black or white or grey, but colours he had never seen before. Ones that didn't have, and certainly didn't require, names. He was seeing a spectrum that was not yet defined—and who was he to define it? The colours were a part of him now, stretching his face like a rubber band as he reached the horizon of the circling dimension door. He could feel himself melting as his motorcycle crumbled beneath him, and he was left floating towards the eye, helplessly drifting towards a metaphysical plane without walls or bodies. His consciousness was now ascending through the door, away from Hogwarts, into a better place—

"What the fuck is he doing? We don't have time for this!" yelled Mr. Jackson, as he frantically ran down the field with Barry.

"He's just been standing there for the past ten minutes," Buggin' Out explained, motioning towards Hagrid, who hadn't yet moved even a couple steps from the end of his porch. "He must be trippin' out pretty hard."

"Well, it's the goddamn apocalypse." Mr. Jackson was using the sleeve of his robe to wipe blood off of Obama's old wand. "We need to start moving."

"I agree," said a grizzly voice above them.

Cube walked off the porch, and squinted towards the sky. He dropped Hagrid's blunt to the ground as he began slow-clapping his approval. "Well, it's about damn time."

The cavalry had arrived.

At least two dozen broomsticks circled Hagrid's cabin, bearing the wizard robe colours that could only be worn by the Order of the Phoenix. The wizard who announced their arrival, Sirius Black, had technically aged considerably since the House of Negus travelled to the Other World, but physically, he didn't look much older than the day he met Harry.

Black whistled for his companions to charge the Hogwarts castle as he slowed down and lowered himself in front of Mr. Jackson.

Hermione couldn't help but notice a middle-aged Asian woman flying near the back of the pack. Before she could inquire further, the wizard hopped off his broomstick and extended his hand.

"I didn't believe it at first," he started. "But seeing you all here now means it must really be true. Isn't it? Your house helped defeat Voldemort all those years ago?"

Mr. Jackson seemed taken aback. "Hold up there, son. We were there when he got pushed through the door but—"

Black slapped him on the back. "Don't be so modest. If it weren't for you people, we wouldn't have been able to expose the chain of corruption that, up to that point, had a near unbreakable stranglehold over the Ministry of Magic."

Cube opened his mouth to say something but changed his mind.

He continued, "When we take care of the situation in the castle, we will make sure you are all very well compensated for your troubles. You will each receive no less than one million quid for your contributions toward the restoration of—"

Cube waved his arm. "Hey man, I know this isn't the best time and all but what's the conversion rate these days from pound to US dollar?"

"It's about 70 pence."

"Goddamn. Get your shit together Europe."

"As I was saying," Harry's Godfather continued as he stared out at the black flumes of smoke coming out of the Astronomy tower windows. "We have the tools to win this war. And we know exactly how to close these doors. In fact, technically speaking, we don't even need to be here. All you need to do is—"

The wizard stopped in mid-sentence and began to choke. At first, it looked as if he had swallowed saliva the wrong way, but when several drops of blood burst out during his next gasp for air, the Negus members immediately jumped back.

"What the fuck?" shouted Mr. Jackson as the point of a blade slipped from the back and through the front of Black's throat and was slowly guided up to his jaw. With a jagged swipe right and a jagged swipe left, the knife was yanked back and forth with the urgency of a paintbrush—tearing Black's lips apart as a kind of forced grin was carved into his face. As a pool of blood rushed out of his cheeks, Black immediately fell backwards, allowing the painter to admire his handy work.

"Why so _serious_?" the Joker asked, wiping the bloody knife with his sleeve before he galloped off, cackling wildly into the Forbidden Forest.

Cube picked up the joint he had dropped on the ground and took a long drag. "Christ almighty. Are we gonna go after that nigga?" he asked, watching the Joker's purple coattails disappear into the fog-filled wilderness.

"Fuck no." Mr. Jackson replied, firmly. "We don't have time for that shit. We need to figure out what to do about that thing—" He pointed to the dimension door that was nearly half the length of the castle. "And I don't even want to think about what we're going to do about those things—" He pointed to the Quidditch pitch where the Rockbiter and Optimus Prime seemed to be facing off in a one on one boxing match. He turned back to Hermione. "Can you close that door?"

Hermione was hanging her head to the side, digging her toe into the mud as broomsticks from the Order of the Phoenix and Death Eaters alike whizzed by overhead. "I think so," she replied softly.

Mr. Jackson couldn't help but notice the sadness in her voice as she stared into the dimension door—he wrapped his arm around her. "We'll be alright," he told her, "But we need you to get us there."

She pulled away from him and hugged her shoulders. Taking a deep breath, she straightened her back and attempted to channel her younger self. "I can do it," she said confidently. Mr. Jackson reached out his hand and offered her Obama's wand—not quite willingly, she accepted the weapon and tucked it into her robes. "But I would need to get close enough for it to work."

"Even if she could get close enough," Cube started, "There's no way she could ever make it through all _that_." The blackened sky was a nightmare filled with wizard curses—one by one members of the Order of the Phoenix were hit and knocked off their broomsticks by green flashes of light while the maniacal laughs of the murderous Death Eaters filled the air. The Negus members could only watch in dismay as silhouetted bodies fell to the dampened earth, creating soft _plunck_ noises as they landed with the rain.

The night was a light show of fireworks; lightning continued to crackle across Hogwarts, temporarily exposing the new beings that seemed to be simultaneously dropped into the wizarding world, and then sucked back up again through the expanding dimension door. Although the Death Eaters appeared to have the upperhand against the Phoenix army, and were already in the midst of pre-celebrations as they shot fireballs into Dumbledore's old office, they took for granted that they had wandered onto an enemy's turf and Severus Snape wasn't about to let them forget.

The lone-wolf wizard always knew the Death Eaters would be back. Though he fully blamed the Ministry of Magic for the death of Harry Potter, he was well aware that the threat of Voldemort and subsequently, his henchmen, were what drove him to commit suicide in the first place. Snape swore until his knuckles were blue that he would get revenge on anyone involved if he was ever presented with the opportunity.

And he was now well prepared to do so.

Never one to limit his use of theatrics, Snape had crafted a special concoction for just the occasion—a going away present of sorts, for some old friends.

Mr. Jackson stepped forward and shook his head. "We can't think about how we're going to get past that yet. We need to think about how we're going to get _up_ there first."

Almost on cue, two figures who had their arms filled with some kind of equipment emerged from the castle and slipped down the soaked Hogwarts grass all the way to the cabin.

Mr. Jackson squinted. "Is that—"

"Dobby did good!" proclaimed the house elf as he and Dean Thomas made their way to the circle and unloaded half a dozen broomsticks on the ground before them.

"Dobby certainly did," exclaimed Dean, who was beaming at (and slightly in awe of) the pile of _Firebolts_ at his feet. "There must be at least a million quid worth of brooms in here. We found them in the Gryffindor common room. Completely left behind." He bent down to pick one up—admiring its craftsmanship in silence as he ran his fingers along its golden bristles. "I've never even held one of these beauties before… fucking one percent Gryffindors."

Without the need for instruction, but instead knowing what needed to be done, the Negus members each picked up a broomstick just as another wizard's body slammed into the ground, not ten feet away from the cabin. They took a collective deep breath and mounted together.

Mr. Jackson turned to Cube as the falling rain seemed to thicken between them.

"Ready to play some Quidditch?"


	23. Chapter 23

**The Boys Who Lived**

"I just wanted to say that I'm proud of you, Barry. Not just for what you accomplished, but for what you helped _us_ accomplish. If it weren't for you, we'd still be back at home, waiting for something to happen to us. But you saw an opportunity, you saw a chance for a better life, and you helped us realize that we ought to take it. At the end of the day, we might not end up in the newspaper or on TV or even in a history book, but what you did matters to me. It matters to me, it matters to them, and it probably even matters to people you've never met."

Mr. Jackson mounted his broomstick, motioning Barry to do the same. "Shall we?" And the pair was off. Together, they zoomed up, up, and into the night sky as the milky way stretched out and over their heads.

As this was the first time that Barry had ridden a broomstick (let alone flown one with a single arm), the young wizard was initially having trouble keeping his balance. Luckily, Mr. Jackson was by his side and there to guide him whenever it looked as if he might slip and fall.

"Push your weight to the front," Mr. Jackson told him as the pair burst through the thunderous clouds, providing them with temporary relief from the rainfall. "Let the broom do all the work."

Barry nodded his understanding as their brooms made an arc in the starry sky, before rocketing back down into the battlezone.

"Without wands, this is going to be tricky," said Mr. Jackson as the pair zagged their way around the Astronomy Tower, heading toward the Quidditch pitch that seemed to be somewhat quieter on the action side. "As long as we can make a clear path for Hermione—" As they circled around the remains of the fallen audience tower, a giant arm (made entirely out of boulders) suddenly shot up between them and attempted to grab for Mr. Jackson's broomstick. "Jesus!" he exclaimed, veering out of the way just in time. He pointed the nose of his broom upwards and ascended, creating some much needed distance between himself and the Rockbiter, who was watching with child-like curiosity from below.

"Where do you think it came from?" asked Barry, circling his broom nervously, as the giant's eyes seemed to follow his every move.

"Where did any of them come from," replied Mr. Jackson, nodding his head towards the chaos that blocked their path to the final dimension door. He glanced back down at the Rockbiter and scratched his chin. "Hmmm…"

Though dozens of young Death Eaters continued to hover around the castle, striking down any form of life that attempted to stop them, prehistoric animals seemed to have been added into the mix, unintentionally aiding the Order of the Phoenix in their quest to push back.

The plan was for Hermione, who was to be escorted by Ice Cube, to wait until Mr. Jackson and Barry could distract enough of the Death Eaters away from the castle before attempting to close the vortex. Meanwhile, Buggin' Out, Dobby, and Dean Thomas were to do the same thing on the other side of the castle.

"So uhh, are we supposed to wait for a signal or something?" asked Cube, who could just make out the tiny figures of Mr. Jackson and Barry hovering above the Quidditch pitch.

Hermione watched as flashes of emerald lightning lit up the world around her. Though the scene was mostly blanketed in darkness, it was still too much for her to absorb. Most of the Death Eaters that flew below them couldn't have been older than she was—with colourful curly hair, and shouts as green as the ones aboard the Hogwarts Express, she began to feel sick as she realized that they could have easily been first years. What would her life had been if she had been born just a few years prior? Would she be riding out below with the rest of them now or would she even be here at all? With two Muggle parents, she wondered if she would even have a place in the world or if she would have been forced to choose a side—abandoning her upbringing for the reality of this new age.

Would she feel sadness if there was no sadness left to feel? If Voldemort's old army really had extinguished what light remained in the wizarding world over the past two decades, would she have even noticed if it was gone for her from the start? She considered her present and sighed. Perhaps things wouldn't have turned out so differently, she realized, thinking back to what Professor Koreander had explained to her about dimensions.

She tightened her grip on her broomstick.

She could hear Cube asking her something but she had long lost focus on her present situation. A memory kept replaying itself in her mind—a memory of a girl who was holding her hand, and asking if she could come along.

 _Was life supposed to be like this?_

She would never forget the feeling of passing through the dimension door for the first time—the chill she felt when she knew, but at the time couldn't admit to herself, what she had just left behind.

 _Was she always destined to lose all of her best friends? No matter the path taken to the outcome?_

She lowered her head and briefly considered releasing her grip, allowing herself to slip off the broom, and drift away with the rain. With the storm pounding down as hard as it was, and now drowning out the shouts she could previously hear by the castle below, she wondered how long it might have been before Cube would notice she was gone.

Suddenly, a purple flash zig zagged across the Great Lake, traveling across the grounds, and winding itself around the clock tower before smashing into a group of hovering Death Eaters. Hermione squinted through the rain, but could only just make out the source—the middle-aged Asian woman she had seen earlier.

She bent forward and bolted her broomstick in her direction.

"Hermione, no!" exclaimed Cube as she tore away from him.

Meanwhile, in the Hogwarts entrance courtyard, Captain Planet stood over the battered and bloody body of Vegeta.

"Reformed, my ass," Vegeta coughed through a spurt of blood. "You think you're so clever leading me into this world… there was never any new power… I know all you ever wanted was another shot at defeating me… serves me right for wasting most of my energy destroying all of those trees… but I regret nothing..."

As Captain Planet grinned and bent forward to finish the job, he paused to remove a packet of floss from his tight red speedo. Not half an hour ago, several Planeteers had arrived to pledge support to their former leader but were unfortunately unaware of his previous descent into insanity. Upon arrival, the Captain devoured each of them whole.

"Excuse me a moment," he told Vegeta as he stretched the thin cord throughout his teeth. "I think I might have some _heart_ stuck in here." He flicked a piece of raw flesh out of his mouth. "Ah, much better. Now where were we?"

He raised his arm and began channelling energy from Mother Nature itself—harvesting the power of the trees, wind, and water as his palms began to glow.

Before he could deliver the final blow, he was hit and pummelled across the courtyard by a beam of light.

Through a blackened eye, Vegeta strained his neck to look up.

"Do you really think now's the best time to be taking a nap?" asked Krillin as he and the other Z-fighters descended from the sky above and touched down beside him.

"Silence... you bald prick," groaned Vegeta. "I had him right where I wanted him."

Elsewhere, about a mile away, an alien-like couple exited out of a newly formed dimension door.

The woman in the pair stretched her arms out wide at the sight of the new world. She was wearing a double pointed crown that looked retro-futuristic—as if it had been crafted in a medieval age but sold as something a latter generation might wear. She stepped forward with her moon-like staff while her husband, Lord Zedd, admired the ongoing destruction of Hogwarts castle.

"Oh Z!" crooned Rita. "Isn't it beautiful! I can just _smell_ the death in the air."

Lord Zedd grabbed Rita by the waist without warning and, as if they were listening to music that nobody else could hear, began to ballroom dance.

"What say we destroy these mortals while we're in such a good mood?" he suggested merrily.

"I've always liked your style," replied Rita as they broke apart, putting several metres between each other as Rita rose her staff in the air and exclaimed, "Make my monster grow!"

She threw the staff at Zedd just as the still flailing body of Captain Planet zoomed by, intercepting the staff and being hit directly with the spell instead.

"You throw like a girl, Repulsa!" yelled Zedd, who crossed his arms and shook his head as he disappeared in the shadow of Captain Planet—the environmentalist's height began to multiply until he was as tall as the tip of the Astronomy Tower.

"You're dead to me, you alphanumeric fuckface," Rita screamed back just as she was crushed under the weight of Captain Planet's first footstep as a giant.

Hermione, who had previously been transfixed by her target of the Phoenix woman, was forced to swerve out the way when Captain Planet ballooned up directly in front of her. She suddenly remembered her primary objective and reverted her path to the Astronomy Tower.

Buggin' Out, who had been tasked with leading Death Eaters over the Great Lake, couldn't help but notice a cloaked figure moving swiftly in the rain, inconspicuously chasing the tail of Hermione's broomstick. He directed Dean and Dobby to finish the job without him before pushing his broom toward the tower.

Upon arrival, Hermione briefly considered disembarking her broom and landing on the tower's rooftop but had a change of heart and whipped out Obama's wand while hanging in midair. She took a long look up at the dimension door that was still expanding above her head—there was something beautiful about it, the way it seemed to spin out new dimensions while breaking down old ones. It was like staring into a galaxy from far away, but watching it evolve in real-time. She held up her wand just as she heard the word _Expelliarmus_! ring out behind her. Her wand was ripped out of her hand and blew over the entirety of the rooftop, vanishing with the wind and rain while a familiar cackle drew nearer.

She managed to duck as Bellatrix Lestrange nearly bowled over her. Voldemort's former right hand woman, did a U-turn with her broom and came to a halt.

"The mudblood is back?" said Bellatrix, somewhat surprised when she recognized Hermione's face. She suddenly broke down into hysterics when she realized something. "Oh my! This is just _too_ perfect." She wiped her tears with her sleeve as she held her wand out. "It's just _too_ bad your old pal isn't here to see this."

Hermione tilted her head in confusion as Buggin' Out charged in, battering Bellatrix with a shoulder tackle. He bounced back as Bellatrix barely registered the hit. She turned to face him with minor annoyance in her voice. "Don't I know you?" she asked, rubbing her chin as she attempted to place him. She snapped her fingers. "Ah yes, I murdered your friend!"

"Now, listen here lady," Buggin' Out started, while slowly reversing away on his broomstick. "I don't know who you think you are but just because you've killed a brotha doesn't meant I automatically know who he was—"

"I put him in a painting!" she squealed with delight. "That was one of my favourite deaths."

Buggin' Out slowed down on his broom, raising his head as his next course of action quietly became clear. "You were the one who killed Snoop?"

Severus Snape took a deep breath before enchanting himself with the Kamikaze curse. He had temporarily stowed himself away in Dumbledore's office—though he was sure his absence went unnoticed, he could still hear the regular cracks of unforgivable curses as they soared over the open hole in the ceiling. An orange glow flickered across the last unbroken pane of stained glass, above a cabinet of trinkets and trophies. Though Snape wasn't tall enough to peer through, he didn't have to see it for himself to know that the rest of Hogwarts was burning. The smoke hadn't yet made it to Headmaster's Tower but he could already feel the heat that was on its way up; it was only a matter of time before all of this was gone. He stepped towards one of the old sporting cabinets, which held a collection of old plaques and celebratory photographs, and was met with his own reflection in the glass protective panel. He looked through himself to see a photograph of an old Quidditch team: a memory in motion of a group of boys who once tormented him, hoisting his younger self onto their shoulders in a moment of triumph, while a young girl he hadn't thought of in many years beamed at him.

He leaned his forehead on the glass and tapped the panel with his fingertips. The girl, who was excitedly holding the golden snitch above her head, waved back at Snape in black and white.

"Would you look at me," he said.

Somehow, someway, Mr. Jackson hadn't managed to get himself killed as he drew the attention of Death Eaters across the Quidditch pitch. As long as he was able to maintain a safe distance (such that he could outfly them if it came down to it), he could successfully lure them over the darkened field and into the hungry arms of the Rockbiter.

So far, it seemed to be working.

"Have you seen Hermione yet?" Mr. Jackson asked Barry, after a few rounds of this back and forth.

"I can't see anything," Barry admitted, squinting his eyes in the shrouded night. Though the rain had finally let up, a thick layer of fog was starting to spread across the grounds, replacing the chaotic storm with a battlefield of unease—after spending the past few hours with drowned out shouts and spells, it was unsettling to actually be able to hear everything clearly.

"Well, keep your eyes peeled. If anything happens, we need to be—oh shit!" The tail of Mr. Jackson's broom was on fire. The pair looked behind them as the culprit, a runaway spell, continued onwards and fizzled off into the mist. "We need to land… somewhere away from that thing."

Mr. Jackson began his descent but before Barry could follow suit, he heard a soft echo in his ear.

" _Buggin' Out, no!_ "

Barry stayed his course, redirecting toward the Astronomy Tower. "I can't leave now, Mr. Jackson. They need my help."

"Goddamnit, Barry! This will only take five minutes. C'mon!" He attempted to lift the nose of his Firebolt but—almost as if the broom itself had decided to commit to the landing—it refused to break from its downward course.

"Sorry, Mr. Jackson. I can't!"

"Barry, just wait for me. There's no sense in doing this alone, we need to…" His voice trailed off as he became a tiny dot at the edge of the Quidditch pitch. Watching to make sure Mr. Jackson landed safely, Barry took one last look before he tightened his grip and launched himself onwards.

Buggin' Out was dangling, hanging on for dear life on the end of Hermione's broomstick. After attempting to ram into Bellatrix and leaving no effect, the aging Death Eater decided to return the favour. With a flick of her wand, she shot a fountain of fire at the Negus member who managed to hop off just as his broomstick burst into flames. He glanced down, where the lifeless body of Scar the lion still lay, and then back up to Hermione who, thanks to the doubled weight, was struggling to keep the both of them airborne.

Bellatrix twirled her wand and squealed as the Firebolt sank before her. "What a sight to behold," she exclaimed, evidently taking much joy from the helpless situation Buggin' Out and Hermione now found themselves in. "Just goes to show that no matter where you run off to, you can never escape the hand of the Death Eaters…" She lost her voice as a shadow fell over them, blocking the slim moonlight that was just barely keeping the rooftop illuminated, and plunging the three of them into darkness. Hermione craned her neck to see what had taken the witch's attention.

" _CAPTAIN PLANET, HE'S A HERO_ ," boomed the gigantic superhero who dropped his hand down suddenly, swatting the paralyzed-with-fear Bellatrix into oblivion without even realizing it. " _GONNA TAKE POLLUTION DOWN TO ZERO_..."

He looked below at the ant-like figures of Hermione and Buggin' Out and bared his teeth. "Snack time," he said, crouching down just as a gigantic sphere of metal flew across the Hogwarts grounds and smacked him right in the back of the head. Rubbing his skull, Captain Planet bent down to see what had hit him. He picked up the head of Optimus the Transformer as the Rockbiter emerged through the mist and declared, "That's just prime."

Captain Planet turned around just in time for the monstrous being made entirely of boulders to lunge directly into him, knocking the wind out of his stomach, and causing the earth to shake as the two titans crashed to the ground.

"We need to land," exclaimed Hermione, who had balanced out the broomstick and seemed to be successfully keeping both her and Buggin' Out from tipping over. "I can't close that door without a wand."

"You can't close that door, period," spat a familiar voice behind her. Hermione turned slightly enough to peer over her shoulder—a group of a half dozen hovering Death Eaters had gathered behind them. Though she didn't recognize five of them—and was more disappointed than surprised when she saw that they were mostly preteen wizards—she gasped when she realized who was leading them, nearly toppling over as she cupped her mouth with shock. A wizard with a long, slightly greying beard was riding a curled, metallic broomstick at the head of the Death Eater pack. Like the others, his robes were black and green, with the Dark Mark plastered along both sleeves. His long red hair fell across his face, almost covering up the diagonal gash that sat where his right eye once was.

"Ron..." Hermione started shakily. "What happened to you?"

Barry Little burst over the shoulder of Captain Planet as the giant stumbled backwards—tumbling into the Quidditch goal hoops with a _TWANG_ as the thirty foot poles bent inwards. The young wizard watched the rusting hoops crumble to the ground, erasing the last remaining memory of the sport from the field. The pitch, which never appeared to have been cleared since the incident, was now a lifetime of old rubble. Barry quickened his pace just as Captain Planet managed to rip off the head of the Rockbiter. With a roar of triumph that bellowed across the grounds, the giant tossed it into the Great Lake.

"Where have you been hiding, little one?" asked Ron slyly as he licked his lips.

Hermione was slowly reversing on her broomstick. "Ron… it's me. Don't you recognize me?"

"I know who you are, Hermione."

"Then… you know that I'm on your side."

"On my side? You've been gone for nearly two decades! I barely recognize your face." He straightened his shoulders and held his arm out to keep the Death Eaters behind him at bay—he could sense the lack of action was starting to make them hungrily anxious. "On my side," he repeated icily, reaching into his robes for his wand and pointing it at his former friend as the tip began to grow green. "Avada…"

Before he could finish the words, a broomstick fell from the sky and dropped between them. Ron tilted his head at the driverless broom, which smashed into the ground and snapped into two pieces. "How strange," he said, just as Severus Snape landed on his back, breaking his shoulder in the process. Ron howled with pain as Snape twisted his wrist and disarmed him. Snape tossed Ron's wand to Hermione. "Don't lose this one, Miss Granger," he said, as he began to glow from the inside out.

Having seen this exact spell trigger directly before her eyes many years prior, Hermione could sense what was coming and knew she only had seconds before it happened. "Harry didn't hate you," she said suddenly, not understanding the force that made her say it. "He was just... angry at everyone. He was angry at me too."

Snape closed his eyes and listened to the soft rain that pattered down on the Astronomy Tower's tin roofing—stopping and starting again in uneven intervals. "It's time to leave now, Hermione," he whispered, locking Ron's arms behind his back as the Death Eater attempted to spin the old Potions Professor off of him.

Hermione released her grip on the broomstick and allowed herself and Buggin' Out to plummet. She didn't look as the world exploded above her, filling her ears with white noise as she felt the falling heat burn her skin. She regained her grip of the broom, saving themselves from a gravity-approved death, and pulled up just in time to see the grinning face of Captain Planet looming over her.

Before the titan could attempt to snatch her out of the sky, however, a single beam of light, followed by a dozen other beams of light, pummeled into him. The Z-Fighters had arrived.

Exiting out of a perfect somersault, Master Roshi landed on Captain Planet's shoulder and reared his arms back. "KamehameHA!" he shouted as a blue stream of energy rocketed out of his palms and blowing into the giant's head. Captain Planet grimaced in agony but was generally unscathed as he slapped his shoulder, sending the old hermit flying. "I'm getting too darn old for this," said Master Roshi as Krillin and Piccolo flew in to replace him.

Having managed to shake the Death Eaters that had been chasing him throughout the sky since he first went airborne, Cube finally managed to swoop in and reconvene with Hermione, who was mentally calculating what it would take to close the dimension door from this far away, while still managing to support her dangling passenger.

"Can you close it?" asked Cube, who was half watching the violet vortex expand and suck in debris and half watching the Z-fighters take turns at trying to take down the monstrous rampage of Captain Planet.

"Not from down here," she admitted. "And I can't get any closer with Buggin' Out on my tail."

Cube tilted his head. "I was just about to ask… Nigga, why'd you have to go and get your broomstick obliterated? Hermione doesn't need this shit."

Buggin' Out seemed offended. " _Excuse_ me, but I heroically sacrificed _my_ Firebolt so that we could both survive."

Cube raised an eyebrow at Hermione for confirmation. Hermione merely rolled her eyes and shrugged.

"Hey!" shouted Buggin' Out, "I can still see condescendingly dismissive body language from down here!"

"I need to set him down," Hermione continued. "If we want a real shot at getting that thing shut."

"There's no time... for that," interjected Barry upon catching up with the other Negus Members. Cube and Buggin' Out breathed a heavy sigh of relief at the sight of their unharmed brother. "Look at how fast it's growing! We'll all be goners in two minutes from now. Let me close it. I can do it."

Hermione nearly laughed but caught herself so as not to discourage the younger wizard. "That's very sweet, Barry. It's just, you need to know the right spell and it's very complicated—"

"I was in the hospital for three months! All I did was study spells! I know how to close it!"

Hermione bit her fingernail. "I'm sure you're good, it's just… studying a spell and performing a spell are two different things."

"Barry," Cube interrupted before Hermione could protest further. "What happened to Mr. Jackson?"

Barry glanced over his shoulder, back toward the Quidditch pitch. "His broomstick went down. But he seemed to be OK. I wanted to stay with him but then I heard Hermione and I just panicked and—"

Cube put a hand on his shoulder. "It's alright. Who's to say what's the wrong decision when you're fucked either way? Sometimes, you've just gotta go with your gut." He directed the head of his broomstick toward the Quidditch pitch. "I believe in you, kid. I wouldn't have followed you three thousand miles across the world to come to wizarding school if I thought you weren't worth following." He paused as the tiles of the Hogwarts courtyard were ripped clean off the ground and sucked straight up into the spinning abyss. "That up there, that's some heavy shit. But nobody expects you to figure out what to do about it. But we know you'll do your best. And even if you don't get it right, it's not a big deal. This whole trip was…" He grinned at Barry, acknowledging the end of this short-lived reunion. "It was a trip." He leaned his body forward to the head of his _Firebolt_. "The best trip."

He bolted off toward the pitch as Hermione turned toward Barry and hesitantly handed over her wand. Without saying a word, she nodded at the boy, and began her descent toward the earth.

"Give 'em shit, Barry!" Buggin' Out shouted from below.

As Captain Planet delivered the devastating blow that caused the dual-form of Kashi to shutter and split back apart into Master Roshi and King Kai, the other Z-fighters struggled to catch their breath. Though they weren't about to back down, and were doing their best to maintain their team lineup, they were starting to realize that they lacked the sheer power needed to take down the unstoppable titan.

Captain Planet cocked his head back and enjoyed a booming belly laugh, sending elongated tremors across the Hogwarts grounds as the sun began to rise in the horizon.

" _I DON'T REMEMBER IT BEING THIS EASY_ ," he bellowed, taking great pleasure at the site of the bleeding warriors who continued to hover before him. " _ALTHOUGH CATCHING UP HAS BEEN FUN, I HAVE A WIZARDING WORLD TO DESTROY AND OTHER DIMENSIONS TO ENSLAVE… YOU'RE SHITTING ME_."

Out of the corner of his eye, Captain Planet noticed the badly bruised, yet still standing figure of Vegeta, who looked up at him from Hagrid's porch as he sipped a cup of coffee.

" _THAT BETTER NOT BE WHAT I THINK IT IS_."

Vegeta smirked and took another sip. "What's the matter? Is the Prince of all Saiyans not allowed to enjoy the occasional… K-CUP?!"

" _YOU SICK BASTARD!_ " screamed Captain Planet as he changed direction and started heading towards the cabin. " _DON'T YOU KNOW HOW HARMFUL THOSE ARE FOR THE ENVIRONMENT? THEY'RE NOT BIODEGRADABLE!_ "

Vegeta casually stepped off the porch and watched half-dismissively as the giant bounded towards him.

" _I'LL MAKE YOU REGRET THE NEXT SIP_ ," Captain Planet exclaimed as he reached down for the Saiyan warrior.

"Maybe you will," replied Vegeta as he tossed his used cup on the ground. "Or maybe…" He brought his hands together and allowed the yellow energy he had been preparing to converge. "FINAL-FLASH!"

The massive beam of light, matched only in brightness by the early sunlight that was causing the Great Lake to shimmer, hit Captain Planet square in the chest, lifting him off the ground and toward the welcoming dimension door. Dazed but not quite dysfunctional, Captain Planet began to power up in an attempt to slow the momentum of the blast.

Piccolo immediately realized what he was doing and shouted at the others to take their places. Without the need for further instruction, the Z-Warriors followed the giant as he was propelled up and into the sky. Master Roshi latched onto his left shoulder. Krillin his right. King Kai took his left leg while Goten took the other. The fighters each grabbed hold of Captain Planet and began to push him forward, overpowering the airbrakes he was attempting to apply.

" _WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! TAKE YOUR FILTHY HANDS OFF OF ME!_ " He began to squirm but to no avail—he had lost complete control over his path and could only watch above him as the purple dimension door drew nearer.

"Damnit... you fools!" exclaimed Vegeta, who had fully exhausted himself after releasing his energy wave and was subsequently unable to assist his friends. "Let go of him or you'll get sucked in too!"

As the giant was guided toward the void, his all-encompassing silhouette seemed to distort and bend the violet light emitting from the dimension door. With one last look at his friends, Vegeta coughed out a final breath before collapsing into the earth.

Following closely behind the Z-fighters as they ushered Captain Planet towards the door, Barry continued the climb with his wand held upright. When he figured he was close enough to attempt the reversal spell, he pulled the head of his broomstick up and held his position in the air just as the giant began to be pushed through.

Gohan turned and looked over his shoulder at Barry before he too disappeared through the door. "Tell my dad we'll see him again someday."

Before Barry could reply, Gohan, along with the rest of the warriors and Captain Planet, vanished from the wizarding world with a slow fizzle—as if the knob of a television set had faded their exit.

" _Confectrix!_ " shouted Barry as an orange wave flew out of his wand and headed straight into the heart of the dimension door. For a brief moment, nothing happened and Barry's heart just about stopped. But then the door stopped spinning—churning to a halt as it hung with an almost haunting silence, in suspended motion.

Barry's eyes widened. The door wasn't shrinking like it did when Dumbledore used the same reversal spell.

It was falling.

He glanced down below at Hermione who was frozen in midair, unable or unwilling to continue her downward path with Buggin' Out. He scanned out towards the Quidditch pitch where Cube had temporarily paused his search for Mr. Jackson and was now entranced by the descending dimension door. Barry clenched his fist. Why didn't it work? Where had he gone wrong?

He ignored the cries of his friends to _get out of there_ and _save himself_ and decided to continue towards the door.

It couldn't end like this—to be the one responsible for the pending catastrophe when there were so many people counting on him. Was this how Harry felt when he decided to break himself from the inside out? The world wanted Harry Potter to save them, but he couldn't. He cracked under the pressure of the black and white mentality that there was a single solution to many problems. In reality, he wouldn't have been able to do a damn thing that anyone else couldn't have done. Unfortunate circumstances had turned him into a superficial icon of hope for the masses.

Harry may have been able to solve one problem but there would still have been others… and there probably would have been other solutions.

Other solutions. Barry snapped his fingers.

Quickening his pace, he bolted toward the centre of the door, feeling the sting of Hogwarts debris as it whipped past his face. He held out his wand for the final time and spun his wrist. A tiny ball of light grew out of the tip as he brought the wand behind his head and launched both ball and wand into the void. Before it made impact, the sphere broke apart, spinning into a reverse dimension door as the falling one collapsed into it. Rather than merge into the much larger one, the doors seemed to absorb each other, temporarily tearing a pocket of space and time before they both popped out of existence.

The rising castle debris stopped in mid-ascension and began to plummet back to earth.

Barry pumped his fist into the sky and let loose a loud _whoop!_ that rang out across the Hogwarts grounds. He looked back down to see if his friends had managed to witness the epicness of what he had just accomplished. Instead, out of the corner of his eye, he took notice of an exchange that was unfolding near Hagrid's cabin.

"I don't believe my eyes," said Voldemort, who used his boot to roll over the body of a fallen wizard. A man that was nearly bald, but still had thin streaks of blond hair, was lying bloody and battered in the grass. Voldemort stared down in disgust at the man's red and gold robes—the pattern worn by members of the Order of the Phoenix. "I spent all those years training you… PREPARING YOU for greatness… and _this_ is how you repay me? What a disappointment you turned out to be." He began spinning his wand around his fingertips, as the near lifeless Draco Malfoy could only look back at the Dark Lord in terror. "I could have made you more powerful than you could have ever imagined, but instead you chose the same fate as your parents." Draco twitched on the ground and managed to turn himself onto his stomach, gripping the grass in his fists as Voldemort loomed above him. His wand was only a few feet away.

"Well, it's been swell. Do tell your folks I say hello." The Dark Lord pointed his wand at Draco as the tip glowed green.

Circling some two hundred feet above them, Barry Little grabbed the upper handle of the Firebolt and commenced a sharp nose dive. Lacking the time for a proper landing, he leapt off just before it plunged into the grass, cracking the broomstick in half. He soared through the air, tumbling across the ground when he finally touched down. With slight trouble standing up—he thought he might have sprained his ankle—he glanced at Draco, who seemed to have accepted his fate.

But then Barry noticed the wand, laying out in the grass beside him. He began to limp over in their direction, pushing himself to move faster and faster.

Voldemort chuckled to himself, "Don't worry, I've been told it's quick." He struck out his wand. " _Avada Kedavra_!... What's this?!"

Barry dove between Voldemort and Draco, scooping up the fallen wand in his somersault. He took one last look at Draco before positioning the wand in his last good arm.

Draco cried out, "Barry, no!"

" _Protego_!"

Draco's wand, already shaking uncontrollably, suddenly turned stark white as a pool of light ripped through both ends, disintegrating the wand and enclosing Barry and Voldemort in an orb of expanding energy. The orb's brightness radiated outwards, first catching the attention of Mr. Jackson who was now zooming his extinguished broomstick towards the scene, and then of the remaining Death Eaters who were still patrolling across the Hogwart's grounds. Mr. Jackson landed next to the ball of energy.

"Barry!" he called out, raising an arm to help block out the blinding light. Barry, who seemed frozen in place, slowly turned his head. Voldemort had collapsed over his knees, with his face firmly planted into the ground. "Barry…" As Mr. Jackson drew closer to Barry, he realized what was wrong.

"... I can't stop it, Mr. Jackson..." Barry held up his palm, which was glowing brighter and brighter.

Mr. Jackson attempted to step into the energy orb but was blocked by some sort of forcefield. "Listen to me. We are going to get you out of there. Hermione! Goddamn." He searched the skies rapidly for the young wizard to no avail. Barry's eyes slowly lifted to lock with his.

"I saw myself," Barry started slowly.

"You don't need to talk. Help will be here soon. Hermione!"

"When Professor Koreander told me to look through the dimension door," Barry continued, "I saw myself. And I was at home and I… I had never left. In some other dimension, I'm still at home watching the TV screen with all of my brothers and we're all together and everything's fine except…" He grinned at his old teacher. "... I'm not a wizard."

Mr. Jackson attempted to pound his way through the forcefield. "Just hold on! I'm not going to let you lose your other arm—I'll get you out of there!"

But it feels so warm, Barry thought to himself, before he dropped dead.


	24. Chapter 24

**The Brothers on the Wall**

"God fucking damnit. God _fucking_ damnit!"

"Are you shitting me? Are you actually shitting me?" Ice Cube swooped down off his broomstick as the previously blinding light from the energy orb began to fade away. Barry's lifeless body was being cradled by Mr. Jackson, who sat wailing in the grass.

"What's going on?" Hermione asked from above. She gently landed her broom, of which Buggin' Out was still hanging onto, and rushed over to the scene. Cube stepped away so she could see for herself.

"Oh… god."

Mr. Jackson looked up. "Where were you? I called out for you! You could have saved his life!"

"I'm sorry… I'm really sorry," Hermione stammered as tears rolled down her face.

"Sorry, isn't good enough! He's dead because of _you_!"

Cube pulled Hermione back and stepped in. "What the fuck does this have to do with Hermione? She's not the one who did this, that nigga is." He pointed at the Dark Lord's slumped over body. Mr. Jackson looked over at Cube and slowly nodded his understanding. Suddenly his neck twitched; Mr. Jackson pushed Barry's body out of his lap just as he jerked his head to the side and vomited.

Buggin' Out crouched down beside Draco Malfoy, who had yet to get up. He stared down at him in silence before returning to his friends.

"It's fucked up that one of us had to go out like this," Cube wiped his face. "But we can't stay out here or we're all gonna go out."

With his eyes glued to his feet, Mr. Jackson stood up. "I'm sorry, Hermio—" The young wizard embraced him before he could finish his sentence, nearly knocking the wind out of him as she squeezed in close.

"That's so sweet," said a chilled voice that instantly split them apart. "If I had any feelings, I might shed a tear."

The House of Negus turned around just in time to see Lord Voldemort pick himself up from the ground and begin to dust himself off.

"How the fuck?" exclaimed Cube just as the remaining Death Eaters touched down. The henchmen surrounded the students in a closed circle, ensuring they had nowhere to go while Voldemort sized each of them up.

Voldemort rubbed his hands together at the sight of this younger generation of evil. "I feel like I've been gone so long! Why didn't _I_ think of conscripting dark wizards from birth? That's just brilliant!"

The Death Eaters began to bow down in appreciation of their long-time hero.

"On your feet, on your feet," advised Voldemort. "That certainly won't be necessary here. Those who know me know that I like to treat my inferiors as equals. So please stand in my presence." He rubbed his chin. "There is one thing I will be needing though…" He stretched out his hand, uncurling his long and twisted fingers until one of the Death Eaters stepped forward and handed him his wand. "Thank you." He briefly admired the length of the wand up close before twirling a green wave of light out of the tip, immediately ending the life of the boy who stood before him. "I hope you don't mind me trying it out," he said as the boy ragdolled into the ground.

The Negus members jumped back at the sight of the dead Death Eater. Voldemort took note of their surprise and grinned. He replied to Cube's earlier question, "Horcruxes, in case you were wondering. I guess we can all thank the horcruxes that I'm still around."

Mr. Jackson whispered to Hermione, "That ring a bell to you?"

"Dumbledore mentioned them at one point but he was never quite sure about—"

"Of course that old fool wasn't sure!" Voldemort cut in. "But then, what was he ever really sure about?" His eyes scanned the Negus members and landed on Hermione. "Certainly not Harry Potter."

Hermione attempted to lunge forward but Cube and Mr. Jackson held her back.

"So anxious to die, aren't we darling?" said Voldemort slyly as he rubbed the bark-like outer shell of his newly acquired wand. "If it makes you feel any better, you'll all get your chance. Together." As he raised his wand in the air, the surrounding Death Eaters rose theirs, following the first motion of a maniacal conductor in a twisted orchestra. But before Voldemort could lead his symphony of death, a pair of broomsticks cut across their heads and two new figures suddenly dropped into the circle.

"Never fear, Dobby is here!" The house elf and Dean Thomas were both pointing wands, that they had picked up off the bodies of fallen Phoenix members, directly at the Dark Lord.

Voldemort yawned. " _Expelliarmus_ ," he said, almost sleepily, sending forth a gust of wind that knocked the wands out of the duo's hands and straight out of the circle.

It took a moment for Dobby to register that he had just lost his wand.

Voldemort tilted his head at the house elf.

Dean Thomas stepped in front of Dobby. "If you want him, you're going to have to go through me."

Voldemort lowered his wand and a red array of glass shards slashed Dean Thomas directly across the chest, sending him flying into the wall of Death Eaters. The Dark Lord returned his gaze to Dobby and lowered his wand again. " _Crucio_."

The house elf screamed in agony as the white fire burned through his veins, pulling apart his nerves as the torturous spell, curled and clawed its way through him. Voldemort raised his arm just as the Negus members collectively took a step forward in his direction. "I could easily turn torture to death if you decide to take another step."

Dobby shrieked again as Voldemort forced through another surge of the Cruciatus Curse.

Cube turned to Mr. Jackson as the house elf continued to writhe and squirm under the relentless spell of his tormentor. "Goddamn… what are we supposed to do?" He looked back at Hermione who had since turned completely pale. Watching the scene in horror, she was covering her mouth, attempting to stop herself from throwing up. "What are we supposed to do?" he repeated as Buggin' Out quietly crouched down to the bleeding body of Dean Thomas and gently cradled his head.

As a final, garbled scream made its way out of Dobby's throat and rang out across the grounds, Voldemort relaxed the spell and withdrew his wand. Something in the sky had caught his attention.

Above the Astronomy Tower, right where the massive dimension door had been absorbed and then dissolved into nothingness, a sparkle of light seemed to rapidly flicker but then fade away. Voldemort squinted at the unusual happenstance.

After a few moments of silence, Voldemort shrugged his shoulders. "I must be seeing things—"

All of a sudden, as if an airborne engine had suddenly been given life, the familiar churn of a dimension door echoed out from the Astronomy Tower, causing Voldemort, the Death Eaters, and the remaining Negus members to simultaneously turn their heads in the door's direction. The violet aura of the door's oval gave way to a brilliant white light that poured out of the door, and stretched out over the castle remains.

Mr. Jackson shook his head at the figures that seemed to be emerging out of the vortex. "I don't believe it."

Dobby, who managed to gather what strength he had left to crane his head toward the light, recognized a face he had not seen in a very long time. The house elf smiled to himself and closed his eyes.

"Winky is here!" an elderly house elf wearing a tattered brown robe exclaimed as a half dozen other house elves followed on broomstick behind him. "And Winky brought help! Winky brought help!"

The aging house elves were not riding alone—each broomstick in the collective's flying V formation was hosting a different medieval-like passenger. These knights held fast as the house elves tentatively circled the Death Eater circle from above, before promptly dropping in. Voldemort hastily issued a shoot-to-kill command to his younger minions who, in their inexperience, bumbled with their wands while the knights touched down and handily sliced through the circle of Death Eaters in one concise movement.

Voldemort stumbled backwards as his henchmen collapsed, in unison, into the dirt. "Who are you people?"

The apparent leader of the knights stood up straight and turned the point of his sword to the Dark Lord. "We are the brothers of the Night's Watch," replied Jon Snow, who took another step forward with his blade. "Though we are the defenders of the Seven Kingdoms and have taken an oath to man the Wall against all who stand against it, we have also taken an oath to protect those who are unable to defend themselves." Winky landed his broomstick and immediately hurried over to the lifeless body of Dobby. "So I'd like to ask you now. Can you defend yourself?"

Before Jon could deliver the final blow, a voice cried out, "Wait!" and the group turned to see the tired, though not yet defeated, Neville Longbottom approaching the scene.

"If we kill him now, he'll just be a martyr for all the younger Death Eaters out there," explained Neville. "You think they're _already_ messed up mentally? Wait until they find out that their urban legend of a role model was murdered in cold blood." He waited for the other Negus members to back him up, but nobody stepped forward to offer their support.

Finally, and somewhat reluctantly, Mr. Jackson raised his voice. "The boy's right. There's a better way to deal with this."

Jon Snow lowered his arm and sheathed his sword. For a moment, he locked eyes with Voldemort, daring him to give him a reason to redraw his sword. Voldemort faked a nervous cough and Jon nodded his head, stepping backwards into his group of knights as Neville took his place.

"Do you remember me?" asked Neville.

Voldemort raised an eyebrow as he stared blankly at the young Gryffindor.

"That's what I thought," said Neville as he turned his back on the Dark Lord.

"But I remember your parents," added Voldemort as Neville froze in his tracks. " _Especially_ their screams after dear Bellatrix began her handy work. I only wish she had been here so that she could have had her fun with the house elf instead of me. I always envied the personal touch she managed to bring to the Cruciatus Curse that I could never—" Voldemort's words were cut short when the sudden point of the Sword of Gryffindor was pushed into his chest, dipping through his skin like water until it had passed through to the other side. He sputtered blood as Neville twisted the grip—forcing the sword in deeper until he noticed several broomsticks in the distance, flying their way.

"You'll remember me next time," said Neville as he released the handle and kicked Voldemort over backwards, trapping him in position as the blade cut into and fastened itself in the earth.

"Did that just apparate out of fucking thin air?" Cube exclaimed, staring at the ancient blade in disbelief.

"I needed help and so it appeared." Neville raised his hands in the air as a member of the Order of the Phoenix touched down and began targeting her wand at the group.

"Do you believe this shit?" Cube whispered to Mr. Jackson as she began patting down the Negus members one by one. "Man, we're on your side!" Cube shouted when it was his turn to be searched.

"Where did you come from?"

Hermione was crouched down over Dean Thomas who, despite the bruises and gashes that completely covered his body, seemed to be coming to. At the sound of a voice she hadn't heard in almost two decades that somehow spanned over the course of a day, she nervously looked up.

"Cho?"

The middle-aged Asian woman that had been questioning Cube spun around.

For a moment, neither Hermione nor Cho said anything. They simply stood and stared—forcing themselves to recognize the other, to overcome the gap that time had left them. Though Hermione knew that it was indeed Cho Chang that stood before her (albeit, a much older version), there was something off, as if something had been misplaced or simply, lost. She lowered her eyes as Cho came to the same realization. A piece of what they remembered had long since gone.

"Cho?" Her name was repeated but this time not by Hermione. Another older woman swooped in on her broomstick and hopped off excitedly at the sight of the silent Phoenix member. "Oh baby, I thought I had lost you!" The redhead embraced Cho, nearly lifting her off the ground as she hugged her in close.

"I'm alright, Ginny," Cho replied, still watching Hermione over her partner's shoulder.

"Lupin wants a word with us in the courtyard." She released Cho and finally became aware of the deathly scene that surrounded her. "What in the…" Her eyes travelled from the now stiff Voldemort, to the sliced up Death Eaters, to the slowly recovering Dean Thomas, to Dobby the house elf. "We have some medical supplies by the castle but I'll need some help bringing them over."

Cho nodded her support as Ginny remounted her broomstick and took off towards the ruined school. Cho looked back at Hermione who was swaying, but still standing, almost as lifeless as the bodies that coloured the grass. "I'll be back in a few minutes," she called over, as if she was afraid to get too close. "Just... try to keep your friend warm."

Almost as if her departure was happening in slow motion, Hermione could only watch on as Cho lifted one leg over her broomstick and pushed off the ground.

Mr. Jackson wrapped his arm around her as her friend shrank into a tiny point in the distance, one that she was now having trouble following.

She looked up at him and half-smiled—for the first time since she had returned through the dimension door, she felt a sense of peace. "Can we go?"

"Go?"

"I think we should leave. I want to leave."

Mr. Jackson opened his mouth to argue but suddenly understood. "Cube, I think we're going to bounce."

Cube, who had been helping Buggin' Out raise Dean Thomas to his feet, turned his head. "You what?" Dean released himself from Cube's grip and limped over to Dobby.

"It's time for us to leave. There's nothing left for us here."

"Just like that? Don't you think we should stick around for some sort of resolution? Won't they have questions for us? What about Barry? Are we just going to leave him here? What about..." He trailed off when he realized his protests were pointless—Hermione was already mounting her Firebolt.

"If his mother is still alive," Mr. Jackson started, "Then I have to tell her what happened. Do you want to come with us?"

"Hell naw. I'm not going back there. Some things you just don't want to know."

Mr. Jackson relaxed his shoulders. "I figured as much. Well…" He took a step toward his brother and held out his hand. Cube, his old student and now, one of his last remaining friends, brushed his hand away and embraced him instead.

"I still can't believe he's gone, man." Cube's voice was beginning to crack. "I'll take care of him but you… you take care of yourself." He pulled away from Mr. Jackson as Buggin' Out stepped forward to say his goodbyes.

"Yo, Hermione!" Cube called out to the former Gryffindor who had already lifted off. "Make sure this nigga takes you to IHOP!"

Mr. Jackson turned to wish his farewells to Dean Thomas but Dean, who was still grieving over the body of his house elf friend, seemed nothing more than an empty shell—he had barely even noticed that Hermione was now rising towards the clouds let alone that Mr. Jackson was leaving them. Mr. Jackson took one last look at the castle, where the smoke pillars seemed to be slowly dying out, and then back to Cube, who was now standing over Barry, trying to figure out what he was supposed to do next.

He mounted the broomstick and allowed the wizarding world to pull back from his feet, zooming out further and further until the haze and dust of the destruction was too small to see, and Hogwarts castle became nothing more than a broken figurine surrounded by trees and water.

"Where are they taking him?" Cube asked Cho as several Phoenix members helped lift Barry's body onto a levitating stretcher.

"To the Hospital Tower," she replied solemnly. "Until they figure out where he should be buried."

He watched as the stretcher was pushed away by a team of nurses, floating along the grass on its path to the tower. "Will they take care of him?"

Cho nodded. "He's in good hands."

Cube returned his gaze to the fallen Dobby who was still being held tightly by Dean Thomas. After several shoulder pats, and pleas to let him go so he could be placed onto a stretcher of his own, Dean looked up at the nurses with tears in his eyes.

Finally, he released his grip, and watched with a strange sense of relief as the house elf was positioned upright, and pulled out of his arms. As the Phoenix officials led the nurses and Dobby back toward the medical wing, a small brown paper bag fell off the stretcher and onto the grass.

"Hey wait…" Dean started as he walked over to retrieve the bag. "Oh nevermind…" he said when he opened it up and realized what it was. "Goddamn that house elf."

Dean noticed Cube's raised eyebrow and tossed the bag over. "Shiiiiit," Cube exclaimed upon pulling back the opening. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"It's what he would have wanted," Dean replied.

"Yo, Neville," Cube called out at the boy who was left staring at the Sword of Gryffindor—it seemed permanently stamped into the earth after the Order of the Phoenix members dragged Voldemort's body out from under it. "Wanna get fucked up?"

Neville lifted his shoulders and sighed. "Sure."

"Buggin' Out?"

Buggin' Out was staring at the Headmaster's Tower—astonishingly, it still seemed to be mostly intact (minus the initial hole in the roof and the black soot that now stained the exterior). "I'll catch up with you, there's just one last thing I need to do."

"Password," Dumbledore's gargoyle demanded, stoically.

Buggin' Out looked around. "Man, there's no one else left in this place. Can't you just do me a solid and let me in?"

"Password," the gargoyle repeated.

"I don't believe this," Buggin' Out exclaimed, turning his back to return to his friends in the underground kitchen.

Suddenly, the gargoyle jumped aside. "I was just messing with ya," it said, revealing the winding dark staircase. "The new boss already told me to ditch the password."

"New boss?" asked Buggin' Out as he passed through the doorway and began his ascent. As the gargoyle closed behind him, Buggin' Out could hear the echos of laughter reverberating out of Dumbledore's office. At last, he reached the top and pushed open the office door.

Vegeta spun around in the headmaster's chair holding a large cigar in one hand and a glass of whisky in the other. "May I help you?" he asked.

Buggin' Out raised an eyebrow. "Uhh… I thought you died out there?"

Vegeta threw back his head and erupted in a fit of laughter. "You thought the Prince of all Saiyans could be defeated? By a red spandex wearing earth hippie? Silly Earthling. I may have needed a moment to catch my breath but I have returned stronger than ever… and now I have ascended to take my place as the rightful Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!" He ceased his belly laugh when he noticed Buggin' Out's speechless expression. "Do not fear me, mortal. I may be in need of a personal assistant—it's a role that comes with great honour."

"Whatever man," Buggin' Out turned around to leave but noticed a half open crate sitting by the entrance. Oddly enough, a soft plume of smoke seemed to be seeping through the cracks of the wooden container. Buggin' Out stepped over to investigate.

"Toned, tan, fit and ready/Turn it up 'cause it's gettin' heavy..."

"Snoop?" Buggin' Out pulled back the container's lid (allowing a mushroom cloud of smoke to billow out) and reached inside to withdraw the painting.

"What's up, nephew?" replied Snoop who took another deep drag of his acrylic joint.

"I thought you were dead! How is this possible?"

"I'm sorta dead. And sorta not. Who am I to decide?"

Buggin' Out excitedly lifted the frame into the air and began looking for a spot on the office wall where he could hang it from.

"Ahem," a familiar voice said suddenly behind him. A painting of Professor Dumbledore was hanging just next to where the birdcage of Fawkes the phoenix stood abandoned. Dumbledore withdrew his pipe and ushered Buggin' Out over. "I just wanted to say that on this great journey of life, you boys have certainly taught all of us that… oh!—"

Before he could finish, Buggin' Out placed Snoop's painting so it hung directly on top of Dumbledore's. He stepped back to admire the artistry of his animated friend.

"Thank you for that," said Vegeta. "The broken record of an old man was annoying me with his constant stream of absurd analogies."

"I'd offer you a hit," started Snoop, "But I'm a painting."

And so it was. Vegeta enlisted Buggin' Out and the other members of the House of Negus to help rebuild the castle and lead the way for its eventual reopening. In order to better prepare themselves for the incoming water crisis that had already crippled North America, Vegeta ordered the installation of state of the art groundwater structures that tunneled throughout Hogwarts—an initiative that allowed the school to takes its first in a long series of steps to restore its former glory.

All was well.

 **THE END**


End file.
